Nate Sanders <nate at nerp.net> wrote:
> 
> How does Debian work on a SS20? I have yet to see someone running it on
> a sparc. How well does it run? I would be using this as a workstation
> mainly. Just need X, Sound, and BitchX :-]
> 
> Anything I should go look into for more info about installing it?

Whoops, this reply is a few days late..

I got a dual-processor SPARCServer 20 running Debian not too long ago.  It
doesn't have the capability to boot from CD, but that's okay, since it's
faster to use boot floppies and install over the network from a nearby
host than to go off the single- or dual-speed drive that's already in it.

I will say that it is slow ;-)  It'd work for BitchX but I wouldn't try
making it play MP3s (well, maybe the dual system could do it, but..)

I tried using it for a while as a workstation, which had it's ups and
downs.  The 8bpp framebuffer on it appeared to be faster than the PCI
video card in my PC at work (which is where the SS20 is), but like I said,
it's only 8bpp, and that gets to be really annoying after a while.

I would have kept using it, but something inside it was making a very loud
noise (not sure if it was a fan or the hard drive -- I should figure that
out at some point ;-)  Also, the display I have with it has a broken red
gun (or some wire leading to it), so it was dim and hard to read.

-- 
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[ Mike Hicks | http://umn.edu/~hick0088/ | mailto:hick0088 at tc.umn.edu ]