On 2006-10-04 01:09:32 +0100, Josh McKee <jtmckee@rmac.net> said:


Indeed. There's nothing preventing a BIOS/LOM combination from being,
well, the same as OBP/LOM :-) But typically they do seem to use some
non-scriptable non-CLI browser-or-special-client-based approach. My
theory is that this makes them less efficient to use (than OBP/LOM or
some CLI-based BIOS/LOM combination of your choice). There's then a
whole argument about whether this is true, and if it is how less
humanlyefficient things manage to win over more humanly-efficient ones
(good example being apple-style scroll bars vs Xerox/Athena ones, say).
But probably that's for another thread on another newsgroup.

(Here's a possible reason why remote access to BIOS/LOM on x86 is
typically via some non-CLI interface: Windows. If you're making an x86
box then you almost certainly want to support Windows, which as far as
I know requires a framebuffer to run. So if you want to provide remote
console access you have to deal with making the framebuffer available
remotely. Once you've done that then it's natural to just have the
BIOS etc use the same remoting thing.)

--tim

On Tue, 03 Oct 2006 18:12:22 -0600
Josh McKee <jtmckee@rmac.net> wrote:


Indeed - for most people who've been raised on SPARC systems, LOM is
just a thin layer over the OBP. On "professional" PC kit, LOM tends to
be an all-out BIOS replacement (going by my limited experience with HP
and Dell servers).


If it has LOM, in which case indeed the LOM will provide out of
necessity, many features the OBP already has. The traditional PC BIOS
basically only offers boot functions. The other functions (the Hole at
15MB, CPU clocking, interrupt and DMA selection, serial port address,
etc) are arcana that originated in the minimalistic design of the IBM
PC. Open Boot on the other hand was designed from the onset for remote
administration.


Indeed, but only if you're dealing with systems that have LOM. I've
seen quite a few "data centres" that use the cheapest PC kit they can
lay hands on, spend a comparative fortune on KVMs, and end up with
admins that spend most of their time getting varicose veins, head colds
and aching backs standing in a cold computer room struggling with as
many BIOS variants as they have systems.

Take care,

--
Stefaan A Eeckels
--
Life itself is a misery and nobody can tell what can be of it.
Those that can tell what can be of it are those who cannot tell
us because they are far from us (dead). -- Very profound scam

> Juergen Sieverswrote:

sec

O.K. there's something wrong with that. I have an identical E450
(4x400/4M and 4G RAM), and it's nowhere near that slow.

application
PHP.

Well, yea. If you know Linux better, then you will probably have
issues with understanding Solaris. I've been a SunOS / Solaris admin
for almost 20 years, and I get better results. But, I came into the
world having to compile and install my own software, so....

I
packages
lost

Son't blame the hardware for this. Most of us just avoid the stuff in
/usr/sfw and focus on /usr/local when we are using the SunFreeware
packages. If we use them at all. I tend not to install every
revision of every piece of softwar ein the universe. And, Apache/PHP
compile and install in minutes on my E450.


It's not that hard. Plus, you can still use the SysV stuff. It still
works under Sol 10.

this

See, you're confusing your lack of knowlege with the capacity of a
system. An E450 can still do some impressive stuff (it has massive
I/O for the size of the box - just imagine 20 300G SCSI drives in
it!) but you need to learn how to use it. If all you want to do is
run a box with no effort, do what you are comfortable with and get a
cheap PeeCee running Linux. But, you might want to take the time to
learn how real datacenter hardware works.

As I type this, an E40 burbles happily to itself next to my wife on
the couch. It's an end-table that also happens to make a good
server. We don't find it loud at all.

thog wrote:

Any experienced admin would know it's too slow for such a machine by at
least 3 orders of magnitude. That the OP didn't know that
immediately...?


Excepting that it's bundled with Solaris 10.
http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/content/submitted/samp.html
Easy to overlook, I agree.


To quote this week's Peanuts, "Learn?"


I fired one up in my apartment today - surprisingly quiet, much quieter
than the X2100 next to it.