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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mel.connect.com.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!paladin.american.edu!zombie.ncsc.mil!news.mathworks.com!newsfeed.internetmci.com!in2.uu.net!van-bc!portal.ca!not-for-mail From: curt@portal.ca (Curt Sampson) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.solaris,comp.unix.aix Subject: Re: ISP hardware/software choices (performance comparison) Date: 8 Jan 1996 13:34:15 -0800 Organization: Internet Portal Services, Ltd. Lines: 49 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <4cs2kn$kfg@cynic.portal.ca> References: <4cmopu$d35@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> <4crnbe$8a@olympus.nwnet.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: cynic.portal.ca Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc:1753 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:1884 comp.unix.solaris:55968 comp.unix.aix:67660 In article <4crnbe$8a@olympus.nwnet.net>, Anthony D'Atri <aad@nwnet.net> wrote: >>Since SunOS is not supported by the new UltraSparcs > >Uh, yes it is. What do you think they run? MS-DOS? OS/360? CTSS? Solaris. `SunOS' generally means `SunOS 4.x.x.' I've heard Solaris called SunOS 5, but on the other hand, I've also heard Sparcstation IPCs called Sun 4/20s. >o You're throwing in framebuffers that are almost certainly not comparable. > ...The graphics hardware in Suns is generally a much different > beast from the price-point cheap stuff in an MS-DOS-market machine. The > latter rarely can usably support a million pixels, and probably don't offer > the speed and acceleration that the Sun card probably does. Rubbish. I have an old, cheap ($200) Mach32-based ATI PCI graphics card that easily supports 1152x900x256, and looks as good on my old Hitachi monitor as the exact same display from a Sun did on it. X runs perfectly fine on it. Acceleration is not that big a deal; X mostly wants a fast framebuffer for day-to-day use, and a PCI card provides that. There are some very fast and very expensive graphics cards available, and yes, they may not be as good as Sun's top-of-the-line stuff. But for those of us not doing real-time 3D modelling, there's no difference. > ...but if you're including a monitor with the Suns, then > that's another mistake. MS-DOS machines seem to rarely be sold with decent > monitors. I rarely see one as large as 17", and they're almost always > spherical, and almost always can't handle even close to 1M pixels without > flickering. I don't think Sun sells anything smaller than 17" now, and I > believe that they only sell cylindrical Sonys doing at least 1152x900. > Again, this is a different beast from an MS-DOS monitor, so's it's gonna > cost more. You don't need one for a Sun, so don't price it in. Anybody with a `workstation sensibility' specifying a PC platform will specify a decent monitor for themselves, which may well be the exact same monitor that would be on a Sun. On the other hand, can you get a Sun with a 14" b/w VGA monitor, which is all you really want to pay for on a server? Or do you have to go out and buy a terminal (though that's hardly more expensive these days, assuming you can find one used). cjs -- Curt Sampson curt@portal.ca Info at http://www.portal.ca/ Internet Portal Services, Inc. Vancouver, BC (604) 257-9400 De gustibus, aut bene aut nihil.