Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uunet!dg!lewine
From: lewine@dg.dg.com (Don Lewine     )
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Yet Another Upgrade Anecdote
Message-ID: <423@dg.dg.com>
Date: 3 May 90 13:46:42 GMT
References: <43777@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> <1161.263f4987@gp.govt.nz>
Reply-To: uunet!dg!lewine (Don Lewine     )
Organization: Data General, Westboro, MA.
Lines: 26

In article <1161.263f4987@gp.govt.nz> don@gp.govt.nz (Don Stokes) writes:
>On the subject of "upgrade by jumper"...
>
>I seem to recall a rumour floating around a few years ago, that a VAX
>11/750 could be sped up by a factor of four by changing a couple of
>resistors.  
Not true.  The 11/750 was built out of gate arrays.  It was the first 
mini-computer to be built out of gate arrays.  Each array had 400 gates.
The gates were not very fast.  It would be possible to build an 11/750
like machine using much faster gate arrays, but that is a different story.


>DEC's pricing structures were always a mystery to me, particuarly in the 
>mid-80s ... they would not discount an aging machine; instead they would 
>introduce a new machine with a higher bang for buck.  

I don't see any mystery here at all.  The newer machince were not only much
faster, they were also much less expensive to build.  The idea was to get
people to stop buying the old expensive to build machines and move them to
the newer faster and more profitable machines.

This is no different (except maybe in the time scale) than any other 
business.  Why does Ford build new designs instead of turning out the 1960
model at a deep discount?

					--Don Lewine