Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!batcomputer!kahn
From: kahn@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu (Shahin Kahn)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: ATTACK OF KILLER MICROS
Message-ID: <9078@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Date: 18 Oct 89 06:45:30 GMT
References: <35825@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> <2121@brazos.Rice.edu> <35897@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV>
Reply-To: kahn@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu
Organization: Theory Center, Cornell U., Ithaca NY
Lines: 23

In article <35897@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> brooks@maddog.llnl.gov (Eugene Brooks) writes:
>In article <2121@brazos.Rice.edu> preston@titan.rice.edu (Preston Briggs) writes:
>>In article <35825@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> brooks@maddog.llnl.gov () writes:
>>>The best of the microprocessors now EXCEED supercomputers for scalar
>>Is this a fair statement?  I've played some with the i860 and
>Yes, in the sense that a scalar dominated program has been compiled for
>the i860 with a "green" compiler, no pun intended, and the same program
>was compiled with a mature optimizing compiler on the XMP, and the 40MHZ
>i860 is faster for this code.  Better compilers for the i860 will open

The Cray-XMP is considerably slower than the YMP.  
The single-processor XMP is no-longer a supercomputer.
Take a program requiring more than 128MBytes of memory (or 64 MBytes
for that matter (but I personally prefer more than 256M to excerice the
VM system alittle!)) (i.e. a relatively BIG job, a *supercomputer* job)
and then compare any micro you want 
or any other system you want with the YMP. or something in
that class.  and then try it on a multiprocessor YMP,  and Please 
STOP USING A SINGLE-PROCESSOR xmp AS THE DEFINITION OF A SUPERCOMPUTER, 
thank you.
And it would be nice if people used "LIST PRICE" for "COMPLETE SYSTEMS"
when comparing prices.  (LIST PRICE = PEAK PRICE !!) (COMPLETE SYSTEM =
with all needed software and a few GBytes of disk with a few controllers)