A Sun Linux thin client could reinvigorate network computing, reports Sean Gallagher in a hands-on review at Channel Insider. Gallagher says the Sun Ray 170 competes with Windows desktops in browser, email, word processing, and spreadsheets, outshining it in applications with mobile workers, such as retail.

(Click for larger view of Sun Ray 170 thin client)

Sun launched its long-suffering Sun Ray line hastily in the late 90s, after IBM's Lou Gerstner and Oracle's Larry Ellison began touting thin-client, network computing. Oracle long ago ditched its Edsel-like NIC (New Internet Computer), while Sun gamely held out, despite its own employees reportedly bringing laptops in from home, and conspicuously using their Sun Rays as doorstops.

Gallagher bases his praise for the Sun Ray on “about a month” spent testing a Sun Fire V20 server running SuSE Linux, Sun's Java Desktop System 2, Sun Ray Server Software 3, and a small network of Sun Ray 170 clients running an embedded Linux operating system. He writes, “If you spend most of your day in a Web-based application, in a spreadsheet or word processing document, or in e-mail, then you probably won't notice much of a difference when someone replaces your Windows PC with a Sun Ray 170 — except possibly the additional room on your work surface.”

Moreover, Gallagher says that “sexy” features give the Sun Ray high appeal in applications such as retail where workers are mobile. The new Sun Ray Server software apparently ties user sessions to personal smart cards, allowing clerks to initiate a transaction on one device, pull their card out and switch to another terminal, log in, and have their screen just as it was before.

The wall-mountable Sun Ray 170 thin client features an integrated 17-inch LCD screen supporting 1280 x 1024 resolution at 60 Hz. It has four powered USB ports, and supports most USB keyboards. Additional I/O includes two serial ports, built-in microphone, cd-quality audio I/O ports, video in port, projector port (supports 1024 x 768 or 1280 x 1024), and the ISO-7816-1 smart card port.

Gallagher's review offers interesting details about Sun's Linux-based Sun Ray 170 client, as well as an excellent dissection of the factors that have historically caused most thin-client rollouts to fail — especially “where some flavor of Unix (and novice Unix users) was involved,” Gallagher writes.

Read the full story here:

 
This article was originally published on LinuxDevices.com and has been donated to the open source community by QuinStreet Inc. Please visit LinuxToday.com for up-to-date news and articles about Linux and open source.