SGI O2
Ranked 7 of 9 workstations by recommenders
Admired SGI workstation with strong design and engineering, fun as a second machine; graphics are slower than contemporaries and it can be noisy.
Admired SGI workstation with strong design and engineering, fun as a second machine; graphics are slower than contemporaries and it can be noisy.
12 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 8
- criticize it
- 4
- approval share
- 67%
Recommended in 6 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 8 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 2 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 6 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Admired design and engineering
“probably the best designed and engineered computer I have ever seen”
Comment from 7 Apr 2026 in “Every GPU That Mattered” “the O2 mouse was smoother than the Sun's”
Comment from 20 May 2026 in “I've built a virtual museum with nearly every operating system you can think of” Fun as a second machine
“It works great but I just use it for /opt since I ran out time to move more of the machine into it.”
Comment from 9 Feb 2026 in “Reverse Engineering the Prom for the SGI O2” “I can see how an O2 can be a fun second machine at work however”
Comment from 18 May 2026 in “The SGI Buyer's Guide”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Graphics slower than contemporaries
“I also played a military SIM a few years later on a SGI O2 but it was really stupid”
Comment from 11 Oct 2026 in “How to head into VR without wearing a headset” “The o2 used a unified memory scheme so it's graphics were never as fast”
Comment from 24 Mar 2026 in “IRIX 3dfx Voodoo driver and glide2x IRIX port” “Quake 2 runs a bit iffy on an O2”
Comment from 24 Mar 2026 in “IRIX 3dfx Voodoo driver and glide2x IRIX port” Noisy and reliability concerns
“I think the PSU is flaky, and I'm not super interested in IRIX”
Comment from 8 Feb 2026 in “Reverse Engineering the Prom for the SGI O2” “The O2 isn't that quiet or that quick even with upgrades!”
Comment from 9 Feb 2026 in “Reverse Engineering the Prom for the SGI O2”
Other workstations people recommend
The four most recommended other workstations, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mac Pro | 49 | 92 | 35% | 11 | 16 yrs10 owners | — |
| Tinybox by tinygrad | 25 | 31 | 45% | 4 | — | — |
| Dell Precision | 23 | 12 | 66% | 9 | 10 yrs6 owners | — |
| Sun SPARCstation IPX | 12 | 5 | 71% | 4 | — | Approved |
| SGI O2This page | 8 | 4 | 67% | 6 | — | — |
What people said
All 13 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I also played a military SIM a few years later on a SGI O2 but it was really stupid”
“that was a pretty expensive option”
“the O2's UMA let it handle far more textures than almost any other contemporary system with reasonable performance”
“the O2 mouse was smoother than the Sun's”
“I can see how an O2 can be a fun second machine at work however”
“I reckon it could still do all of that for me today”
“I used to dream of owning an O2, in no small part due to it being the host of Erwin from UserFriendly.”
“probably the best designed and engineered computer I have ever seen”
“Quake 2 runs a bit iffy on an O2”
“The o2 used a unified memory scheme so it's graphics were never as fast”
“It works great but I just use it for /opt since I ran out time to move more of the machine into it.”
“The O2 isn't that quiet or that quick even with upgrades!”
“I think the PSU is flaky, and I'm not super interested in IRIX”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.