Hi

Well first off, your English is far better than my Italian!

PGX32 is a PCI card - I think it's 8Mb rather than the built-in 4Mb so
not exactly a graphics giant but it does the job for a basic display.
There are linux drivers etc. - it's recognised by Debian and Gentoo and
I think I also had a NetBSD up on one of these a while back. Memory is a
bit hazy on this though... But the important point is that the Sun PROM
recognises the PGX32 so you can see what's going on right from boot.

People have fitted other PCI cards that are blank until X starts - fine
once you know the machine's all set up and boots fine etc, but not what
you want for experimenting...

Given the prices on your local Italian ebay you describe I'd buy that
machine you've found, and look on ebay in the UK and USA for RAM and
maybe even a 440 cpu - neither of which should cost a fortune and should
have reasonable international shipping costs.

And of course upgrading the HD is simple if/when you decide what OS you
want to run and actually use the machine for something! I think there's
a limit of 120Gb so don't go mad

Good luck,
John



topetto wrote:
>>>I have an Ultra10 with 440cpu and 512Mb RAM with a PGX32 PCI graphics
>>
>>card running Debian Sarge (easy install from CDROM as long as you have
>>one, download the mini-install iso from the net, boot it and then it
>>builds the rest via ftp once up and running a minimal system. You can
>>net-boot etc. but it's not so simple!). The PGX32 will give you 24bit
>>output at a decent resolution.
>
>
> Hi Jhon,first of all thx for you answer...is the pgx32 the standard video
> board of the sun ultra 10 system?
>
>
>>An Ultra10 is essentially the same as an Ultra5 except that it's a tower
>>system. But it has more space (hence runs cooler), and it's easier to find
>>cheap RAM as the Ultra5 needs "low profile" or remove the floppy etc.
>>
>
>
>>I guess a slower cpu and less RAM would still run (mine had 256Mb for a
>>bit and was OK), but I'd try to go for the 440 powered machine if you can.
>>That said, these cpus come up on eBay and you can swop them in. But of
>>course everyone wants the 440!
>>None of this will blow away even an old PC in performance terms, but if
>>you want a dependable, stable box then it's certainly worth considering
>>and it won't be hopelessly slow either. I use mine as a local webserver
>>(apache, php4, mysql4 etc.) for development work and it's great...
>>
>>To give you an idea of cost, I bought my Ultra10/440/256Mb/CDROM for under
>>£10 on eBay and fitted an old 40Gb IDE hard disk that was lying around.
>
>
> That's the question, I've searched on ebay (.it) but prices are *mad*, I
> found one for 150euro! It's really too much... You are lucky living in UK
> where maybe there's much more SUN hardware "on sale". In Italy is quite
> difficult to find a full functional Ultra 5 system cheaper than 40 euro.
>
>
>
>>So trying out the ultrasparc "world" need not cost a lot! Some people on
>>eBay try to charge a lot more for these old machines, my advice is watch
>>and wait...
>
> Now I found 2 Ultra 5 system with 360 mhz,256k,128mb and 8gb for 50? both
> (one is reserved for a friend,curious like me )and I try this workstation
> with all the o.s. that I will find,but I remain in touch for an Ultra 10
> like yours
>
>
>
>>Good luck!
>>John
>
> Thank you!Sorry for my "so called" English, have a nice day,
> Andrea
>
>