NetworkWorld: Testing the Enterprise Linux Load

"We took a close look at several commercial Linux distros targeted towards stand-alone, enterprise server installations to assess whether companies selling this packaged open source code are coupling it with the tools and services necessary for enterprise server use. Several organizations declined to participate, either because they "weren't ready yet" or because they target small server, OEM or desktop environments with their distributions."

"Of the distros tested, we have no qualms recommending either Caldera OpenLinux eServer 2.3 or Red Hat Deluxe 6.2 to an organization that has not yet used Linux in an enterprise server context. Both products are well aware of their environments, with a slight edge to Caldera eServer's configuration sensing capabilities. Caldera eServer further gained our confidence - and the Network World Blue Ribbon award - by offering a lot of installation time network alternatives for Samba and NetWare. The TurboLinux Server 6.0, however, gets kudos for offering symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) kernels that no other distro tested in this review did."

"SuSE Linux 6.4 had weak support practices for its retail package, but otherwise is a worthy competitor. Newcomer Storm Linux 2000 Deluxe, like SuSE, has great new-user support but wasn't quite focused toward enterprise server use."

Complete Story

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