>Sun is already able to differentiate their server offerings.
>
>Sun's ASP for servers is 50% higher than IBM, and double Dell or HP. That's not
>because their products are similar, it's because they are actually differentiated.
>
>Sun is also aggressively embracing SSDs, which is a very good way to shift dollars
>from storage vendors to server vendors.
>
>Their x86 growth has leveled off a bit, but 20% is still pretty big growth. What
>they really need is a larger scale sales force that really can touch most enterprises.
>Right now, they just have a sales force that touches folks using SPARC.

sun will be interesting to watch. I think they are undervalued right now given their install base and tech portfolio. their open source strategy is actually good and makes sense given where the market goes. they need to build a better services around it.

most importantly governments worldwide are starting to drop big bucks on it-infrastructure and they require open source all the way. besides the server desktops are looked at again and while in the last generation oo was out of question cause of breaking macros that might not be viewed as deal-breaker this generation.

not sure about rock. from what I hear it is coming in september and it is going to be solid. financial customers are holding off and taking a wait and see stance for another year before deciding to either embrace rock or phase out sparc.

sun's biggest problem is that their marketing and their image sucks. I just talked to an small isp in the banking sector in frankfurt who dropped €€€ on a dell blade center, and was totally astonished to hear that sun sells x64 blades at competitive prices...

max