High
prices come with consequences, especially in a market where free
alternatives are available for those who don't want as much support,
software updates and certification as Red Hat offers. "We are working
very closely with Red Hat especially to really be conscious about the
fact that if we're not careful, we're going to lose these customers to
other open-source projects," said [Judy] Chavis, [director of business
development for Dell's enterprise product group], mentioning
noncommercial alternatives such as the Debian effort.
You will be able to add OpenSolaris to that mix very soon.
Sun in
particular is working hard on a version of Solaris for x86 servers --
those that use processors such as Intel's Xeon or Advanced Micro
Devices' Opteron. "We do have some
customers running it on Dell servers," Chavis said of the x86
version of Solaris, but Dell has no partnership with Sun for the
software.
"They've got to get to the point where Microsoft and industry-standard operating systems are today, then we'll talk. But they don't have the volume or the customer demand for it," Chavis said.
"They've got to get to the point where Microsoft and industry-standard operating systems are today, then we'll talk. But they don't have the volume or the customer demand for it," Chavis said.
Don't wait too long, guys. You may miss it before you even know it.
