On Wed, Mar 20, 2002 at 05:13:32PM +0000, doughanson at attbi.com wrote: > We have a Sparc 20 with 2 CPU's here at work and would > like to load an open source OS on it. Can anyone > recommend which flavor of Linux would run best on this > type of hardware? We are only going to use it as a > print server. Well, I run Debian Linux [1] on a Sparc IPX and an Ultra 1 and I am pretty happy with it. There are a few quirks with running Debian on Sparc hardware as opposed to i386, but that's going to be true of any alternate architecture. Also, right now there is very minimal support of 32 bit Sparc in the 2.4 Linux kernels, which can be kind of a hassle (see the Debian Sparc list archive [2] or the LKML archive for more details [3]). So I'm not sure how well you'll be able to get SMP working right now - I know that I've seen posts where people discussed there results, but I don't remember the results. I also know that there are other Linux distros that support Sparcs to various extents, but I don't have any experience with them. Take a look at the UltraLinux[4] page for lots of good info and links on Linux on Sparc. I know some of the BSDs work on Sparc, but somebody else will have to speak to how well. 1. http://www.debian.org/ 2. http://lists.debian.org/ports.html 3. http://mailman.real-time.com/pipermail/linux-kernel/ 4. http://www.ultralinux.org/ -- Jim Crumley |Twin Cities Linux Users Group Mailing List (TCLUG) crumley at fields.space.umn.edu |Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota Ruthless Debian Zealot |http://www.mn-linux.org/ Never laugh at live dragons |Dmitry's free,Jon's next? http://faircopyright.org