Sun's x86-based systems deliver faster processing power; offers price points below HP, Dell and IBM.

Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ:SUNW) continues to champion the reduction of cost and complexity for customers by offering a price reduction on its recently announced Sun Fire(TM) V65x system. Capable of running standard Linux distributions, Red Hat Enterprise Linux or the Solaris(TM) operating system, the x86-based systems beat competitive offerings from Dell, HP and IBM--up to 25 percent less on the Sun Fire V60x system and up to 28 percent on the Sun Fire V65x. Sun also announces that the V60x system will receive an Intel Xeon processor upgrade to 3.06 GHz. The entry-level systems have had tremendous success in the education market with universities such as University of Queensland and University of Namur and in the mid-market segment with partners such as Tech Data.

The University of Queensland will use Sun Fire V60x systems to run molecular-scale computations to power one of the largest super computer facilities in Australia. The low-cost systems are linked with Sun(TM) ONE Grid Engine and can deliver high compute power for memory intensive applications. According to Professor Sean Smith, head of the Centre for Computational Molecular Science, "The research we conduct requires the simultaneous input of an enormous amount of computations. We were therefore looking to develop a cluster facility that delivered superior throughput capacity as well as raw speed on any one processor.

"The super computer facility Sun will deliver consists of 256 processors linked together to harness multiple compute power and deliver increased throughput of small to moderate size computations," he added.

"We have implemented 80 Sun Fire V60x systems to run our HPTC applications to create one of the most powerful and visible computing systems in Belgium," said Mr. Jean-Pol Vigneron, Director, Science Computing Facility, University of Namur. "In combination with the software technology, Sun ONE Grid Engine, these low-cost systems provide the reliability and availability that are critical to the uptime of the applications that we are running."

"Our customers are excited about Sun's latest x86-based systems. Through our recent agreement with Sun Microsystems, we have been able to extend our Sun portfolio with the Sun Fire V60x and V65x systems," said Joe Serra, vice president of software and systems product marketing of Tech Data. "These systems meet mid-market requirements for low-cost, high performance solutions."

"These price reductions and processor enhancements provide increased customer value while demonstrating Sun's commitment to delivering competitive price/performance x86 platform products," said Souheil Saliba, vice president of marketing for Sun's Volume Systems Products group. "Sun continues to provide Tech Data and other partners with products that will open the door to new markets and an additional revenue stream from standard Linux distributions or Solaris x86-based solutions."

Sun's popular Sun Fire V65x 2U rack-optimized x86 server model with a single 2.8 GHz processor has been reduced from $2,650 to $2,550. The Sun Fire V65x model with dual 3.06 GHz processors has been reduced from $4,595 to $3,995.