Actually, for an A or N-class, the issue of peripheral hardware is
nowhere near as dire as for the NIO systems.  The problem with 9x9, 99x
and 9x8 systems has to do with HVD (high voltage differential or FWSCSI
in MPE parlance) SCSI devices such as disk drives and tape drives.
There has not been an HVD disk drive manufactured in a few years and
they probably never will be again.  The LVD devices used in A and N
systems are still being manufactured and should be for a while longer.
However, please understand this situation will change in the future as
cheap, fast and huge capacity serial ATA or SATA drives take over the
world and the PCI architecture evolves into the PCI-Express architecture
starting in 2004.

The server of 2006 will be vastly different than the server in 2003.

If you have a PCI system (A and N) there should be a good supply of
newly or recently manufactured LVD disk and tape drives for several
years to come.  I would say however, that much beyond 2010 should be
problematic, all things being equal.

If you have a pre-PCI system (9xx), you have a challenge and some
alternatives.  Technology does exist to allow you to connect the latest
fiber or LVD disk drive or arrays to your FWSCSI connections, you can
contact me or Craig Lalley offline for more information.  These
solutions work and work very well but they are not supported by HP.  :)
Sorry, I couldn't resist.  For your SE SCSI connections, Seagate is
producing new technology disk drives with an SE SCSI connection,
especially targeted at legacy systems.  Again you can contact me offline
for more info.

Denys

-----Original Message-----
From: HP-3000 Systems Discussion [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Greg Terterian
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 11:49 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [HP3000-L] End of Support

What difference does it make?  This is what I dont understand...  There
will
be always 3rd party who will support your hardware for a long long
time...
plus you should not even depend on that...  You should purchase at least
5 of
each item that you have in your system (ie: Disk drives, tape drives)
and at
least 2 of each board in your system (I/O card, cpu and so on) and have
it on
hand...
This way you will be covered till Year 2020...

But to answer your question it is supported till 2006

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