Sun Microsystems is ending its "try and buy" programme that allowed customers to sample a range of hardware kit for 60-day trials with tech support thrown in for free.

The company - which is currently facing a multi-billion dollar takeover from rival database giant, Oracle - didn't explain why it was dropping the radical offer.

Customers enjoyed free use of the likes of a Sun Ultra 27 Workstation or a Sun SPARC Enterprise T5440 server for two months. All punters had to do to avoid being charged for the kit required was to return the gear before the 60-day trial period was up.

Sun said on its website that it will honour applications for its "try and buy" scheme until the end of biz play on Friday, 18 December.

Perhaps take-up wasn't quite what Sun had hoped for - with IT budgets squeezed it's fair to speculate that tech bosses turned a blind eye even to free trials of hardware. After all, the paperwork was probably a bit of a headache in these cash-strapped times. ®