Sun, Java Win Starring Roles With HBO

SAN FRANCISCO—Sun Microsystems Inc. is getting into the movie business with a new deal the company announced Friday.

During his keynote presentation at here, Sun CEO Scott McNealy is expected to announce that Sun and Home Box Office Inc., of New York, have struck a deal where the cable TV powerhouse will standardize on Java for its video network systems and Sun will provide the infrastructure for a digital programming repository to handle program content for 15 HBO and Cinemax networks over the next three years.

The Sun-based system will move HBO from a tape-based server platform to a more reliable digital server architecture, company officials said.

The new HBO system consists of two Sun Fire 6800 servers and two Sun StorEdge 9980 systems, the company said.

The Sun-powered HBO digital programming repository is capable of handling up to 50 terabytes, or 5,000 hours, of content, Sun officials said. It also features a constant data rate of above 300MB per second, with peak performance of 900MB per second, they said.