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Sun Enhances, Sets Promo Pricing For Sun Ray Education, Research

Posted on: Wednesday, 23 March 2005, 03:00 CST

Sun Microsystems Inc. plans to offer a new, lower pricing model and enhanced features for the Sun Ray Server Software 3 and the Sun Ray 170 ultra-thin client for education and research institutions.

According to Sun, interest in the Sun Ray ultra-thin client computing environment for the education and research market has been growing significantly, and the user group (Sun Ray Users' Group at www.sun-rays.org) has grown to more than 500 members. The site, built by users, for users, is hosted on Sun technology at the Santa Clara, Calif. County Office of Education.

The Sun Ray Server Software now provides cross-platform support for both the Solaris and Linux Operating Systems, so customers seeking to expand their Linux environments onto the desktop will be able to use the Sun Ray ultra-thin client.

The software and client will support Sun Java Desktop System, release 2, Red Hat Advanced Server 3 (32-bit) and SuSe SLES 8 (32- bit).

The product also helps enables moresecure computing, adding a privacy mode function that encrypts traffic between the Sun Ray Server software and the Sun Ray ultra-thin client. This can block casual hacking attempts that use packet sniffing or snooping software to view sessions or pick out keystroke data for a replay attack.

Other enhancements include expanded peripheral support on the Solaris Operating System, Sun Ray ultra-thin client LAN deployment capability that helps customers mix client devices on the same network and improved performance capabilities that can reduce the minimum bandwidth requirement for a single client session by 50 percent.

Kim Jones, vice president of Global Education and Research at Sun, said that in line with its mission to help education and research institutions reduce the cost and complexity of their networks, Sun is now offering the Sun Server Software for $99 per 20- seat license or $2400 per site license.

Sun Ray ultra-thin clients provide education and research customers with an interoperable desktop computing solution that reduces the maintenance, upgrading and operational costs associated with most "fat" PC clients.

For a limited time, Sun is offering promotional pricing on a select configuration of the Sun Ray 170 ultra-thin client for the education and research market. The Sun Ray 170 ultra-thin client is $750 per system.

For more information, see www.sun.com.

Copyright Publications & Communications, Inc. Feb 2005

Source: Enterprise Networks & Servers

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