July 26, 2006 11:45 AM PDT
The Sun Fire X4500 system, code-named Thumper, accommodates 48 drives. Right now, these can provide a capacity of 24 terabytes, but
forthcoming 1GB drives will double that capacity.
The hybrid system also has two AMD Opteron processors. The X4500 starts at $32,995 but costs $69,995 for a model fully loaded with disks. This
view of an X4500 without its top cover shows the drives, which are mounted vertically in four banks of 12 across the top of the system.
Photo by Sun Microsystems