You will be able to get a Power 520 in tower format, look at http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/power/hardware/520/configs/8203e4a1a.html

This looks like you could put it on your desk if you wanted, but you certainly could put it under your desk, so it's going to be a similar experience to "desktop AIX". We got one in this week for $5k where I work - not cheap but not mainframe prices.

However, unfortunately, the noise these things make is unforgivable, so you'd be best off getting the rack-mount version, putting it in the machine room and accessing it remotely, unless you absolutely need AIX with fast local graphics.

At startup it makes a noise like a jet engine during landing, and then when it settles down it makes a noise that is audible and annoying half a floor away. The thing is packed with small high-speed fans.

Kind of makes me appreciate my Sun Blade 1000. It's not a fast machine of course, but it also has a hot cpu inside and yet is so quiet people walking by my desk don't realise it's on and fiddle with the power switch (it is on top of a pedestal/shelf unit next to my desk).

Presumably the POWER6 inside the POWER 520 EXPRESS machine is not just hot but ludicrously hot.

nice shell prompt

HOST=`hostname | cut -f2-3 -d-`
PS1=$HOST:'$PWD \$ '

got this from a book I think, possibly the Stephen Coffin SVR4 book.

results in, for example :

elrond:/home/cmorgan $ cd ..
elrond:/home $

Command-line recall and editing using the arrow keys in Korn Shell:

alias __A=^P
alias __B=^N
alias __C=^F
alias __D=^B

Put this in your .kshrc

This works on Solaris at least. I haven't tried it on Linux since bash does this anyway. So if for some reason I don't have bash I can at least use the arrow keys for command-line recall and editing.

Note, those are control characters, not the '^' character and then P N F or B. You can insert control characters into a text file in Emacs by Ctrl-Q Ctrl-P (to insert Ctrl-P for example).

10 biggest files or subdirs in current working dir:

$ du -sk * | sort -nr | head -10