Well, if rebuffing IBM's $7 billion offer as too low the weekend before last was a negotiating tactic, then the gambit has blown up in Sun's face according to CNBC.

Following a Bloomberg story saying Sun wanted IBM to come back to the table - a story that made no mention of price - CNBC rustled up its own sources who told the cable channel that IBM had washed its hands of the whole affair.

It reportedly wouldn't touch Sun now having been told by the Justice Department, the SEC, and the European Commission that it would be in for a six-nine month review that would mean financial and business practice disclosures that IBM is not prepared to make, preferring to lie low and not attract attention.

CNBC said it was told Sun had reached out to IBM in a letter Tuesday offering to be utterly flexible on price and terms.

IBM had reportedly not told Sun it wasn't interested when CNBC ran with its story.

Bloomberg had reported that Sun was ready to restart takeover talks with IBM provided IBM put more starch in its commitment to actually close the deal despite whatever regulatory hurdles it had to vault.

Supposedly IBM had trimmed the price it was willing to pay to somewhere between $9.10 and $9.40 a share after due diligence and after being asked for guarantees that it would acquire Sun no matter what trouble the pair ran into with the regulators.

Sun was supposedly willing to take a lower price of $9.55, down a dollar, in exchange for such an undertaking.

The Sun board was reportedly split over whether or not to accept the IBM offer with chairman Scott McNealy supposedly leading the rejection side.

CNBC said Sun then reached out to other companies again and got nowhere.

It reportedly talked to HP, Dell, Intel and Cisco. Cisco CEO John Chambers said Wednesday in Korea that if Cisco was interested it "would probably have already moved."

CNBC said the problem would have been the server market share that IBM would have had. Combined with Sun it would have been something like 42%, enough to set off the European Commission.

CNBC also claimed that after doing due diligence, the competitive position IBM would have had vis-à-vis HP with its 30% share of the server market didn't look as attractive as it did going in.