The Solaris 10 10/08 release is the result of the collaboration between Sun engineers and OpenSolaris community members. All the new features Sun is delivering with this release were first delivered into OpenSolaris before being included in the enterprise Solaris 10 10/08 release.

The new features in Solaris 10 10/08 are:

• ZFS File System Enhancements: The ZFS file system has been enhanced with recent work from the OpenSolaris community, providing ease of data management with no additional cost for acquisition or support. The new version of Solaris ZFS file system offers increased data integrity and fully integrated disaster recovery capabilities. ZFS file system can be used as the sole file system for any class of system, with support for booting and/or for use as a root file system.
• Virtualization and Solaris Containers Updates: Solaris 10’s virtualization technologies, such as Solaris Containers, have been enhanced with new features to make it even easier for customers to migrate workloads among Solaris systems and reducing the administrative overhead necessary to move a container between unlike system configurations.
• Intel architecture optimization: Sun and Intel continue to collaborate to help ensure Solaris 10 will support for Intel’s latest Intel Xeon processor line so customers can benefit from the improved functionality, power efficiency and reliability of systems that contain those CPUs. In addition Sun and Intel have achieved several new world records for Solaris 10 on Sun Systems powered by Intel Xeon processor 7400 series.

Through the Solaris OS update model, customers can upgrade to Solaris 10 10/08 without requiring additional hardware/software upgrades or recertification of existing projects and applications. In addition, Solaris 10 10/08 preserves full compatibility with over 7,000 third-party products and customers internally-developed applications.