“The booming thin-server market is expected to reach $13 billion
next year, compared with $1.5 billion this year, said Pu Xiang,
senior analyst at San Jose, Calif.-based research firm Dataquest.
That growth comes from small businesses, where existing server
technology may be too complex, and from NAS and application
servers, especially Web caching, she said.”
“Most appliances are shipping with a stripped-down version of
Linux, but stripped-down versions of Microsoft Corp. Windows NT
also are common, Xiang said….”
“While Linux is becoming popular, applications keep the
operating system transparent, said Elmendorf. “No one wants to put
people through the learning curve of Linux or Unix,” he
said.”