8/9     What's a good place to buy a SMP x86 box to run either FreeBSD or
        Linux?
        \_ I looked at these people, and they weren't _too_ overpriced, but
           I ended up building it myself:
           I ended up building it myself using basically the same HW:
           <DEAD>freebsd.swt.com/bsd_dual.html<DEAD>
           --dbushong
           \_ Seems kind of pricey. I went to fry's today and a dual mb
              was $150, the two procs were $160 each, 128 mb ram was
              $100 and the case was $100, total $670. (I have the
              drives and cdrom). I was looking for some place that sells
              a pre-built one for approx. $800-$900. Used is okay for
              me (dual 300 PIIs or alternatives).
              \_ Well, I bought all the parts at Central and City-Com (better
                 prices) and the machine totalled ~ $5300, for:
                 2x PIII733 flip chip, SuperMicro 370DL3 MB, 512MB ECC PC133
                 Registered DIMM, 4x IBM 10k rpm 36GB drives, Ecrix VXA-1
                 internal tape drive, case, cdrom, floppy, fans, etc.
                 Roughly the same thing (but with Cheetahs instead of
                 IBM drives) was about $8k from SWT.  This is less
                 of a markup than many places.  Technically you can buy
                 SMP linux boxen from Dell these days.  --dbushong
                        \_ don't buy from Dell.  If you buy a "Linux box"
                           from Dell they don't ship you so much as a boot
                           floppy, and all the driver/management software
                           they ship runs only under Windows.  Plus their
                           support sucks sucks sucks.  Go VA Linux.  -tom
                           \_ I can't go VA Linux as I work for a competitor.
                              We just don't make SMP boxes yet (our price
                              point is much lower than VA).
                              \_ how about a name, so I can buy from you?
                                 \_ We don't really make desktops, though
                                    you could put a video card in one of
                                    our boxes. http://www.cobalt.com
                 \_ That's a pretty stacked machine. I'm just looking
                    for a reasonable performance/prcie SMP box to replace
                    a Sun Ultra 2 (2 200 MHz UltraSparcII's).
        \_ Why waste a good SMP box on a bad SMP OS like Linux?
                \_ As if FreeBSD was any better for SMP boxes.
              \_ I said either FreeBSD or Linux. I haven't made up
                 my mind yet. I'm more familiar with Linux (running it
                 since 1996), but I agree the kernel level locking is
                 pretty bad. I've heard that FreeBSD is better or
                 possibly even Solaris x86.
                 \_ I believe FreeBSD still does kernel level locking too,
                    but I certainly have liked the performance better on
                    our SMP FreeBSD box than on our Linux box running the
                    latest kernel.  I swear when the Linux box gets one big
                    java program that's not even sucking all the memory it
                    just dies.  --dbushong
           \_ because it's there
                 \_I've said it before, i'll say it agin(I was deleted before)
                     Solaris x86 sucks, don't do it.
                     \_ Yes, I heard several people from Sun say that too.
                        Are you from Sun too?
                         \_ I am not, but I have also been told by a guy from
                            Sun that it was never really a priority so it just
                            go thrown together.  Also the comparisons i posted
                            earlier (the only part of my post not deleted)
                            paint a pretty clear picture.
                            \_ What comparisons?
                            \_ Until recently, Sun's x86 priorities were aimed
                               at SMP servers, since that's what they had
                               contracts from OEM's like NCR for.  This is why
                               video drivers for x86 were not a priority.  This
                               is changing due to the popularity of the "free"
                               Solaris deal.
                               \_ So Solaris x86 on a dual PII/PIII box would
                                  be better than either FreeBSD or Linux?
                                        \_ Depends on what you want to do with
                                           it & what you need to run on it.
                                           \_ Translation: yes, for just
                                              about everything, solaris x86
                                              will be better MP, IF it is
                                              happy with the hardware.
                                           \_ Compiler to build some c code,
                                              apache/perl for cgi, javac for
                                              java code and X.
           \_ Even though he looks small, Pikachu is the best pokemon.
              I don't care what you think!
              \_ Pikachu is the dark lord and master of pokemon.
                 \_ B-but... but he's so cute! I just wanna hug him.
                    \_ Pi-ka-CHU!!