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From: karl@sugar.hackercorp.com (Karl Lehenbauer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Amiga 3000 vs. Sparcstation
Message-ID: <5683@sugar.hackercorp.com>
Date: 9 May 90 15:58:59 GMT
Reply-To: karl@sugar.hackercorp.com (Karl Lehenbauer)
Organization: Count Floyd's 3-D House of Unix
Lines: 26

Sorry about losing the subject and references of the original article, but...

The $5000 Sparcstation is still only a rumor at this point.  To paraphrase 
Brooks, today's paper tiger can always beat today's real system, as long as 
you don't actually have to get any work done.

Another thing about workstations is that secondary costs are greater than for
PCs (PCs in this context includes Amigas).  That is, you are going to pay more
for memory, disk, software and service for a workstation.

Granted, as volume increases in workstations, the price difference for 
peripherals and software should decline.  SPARC chipsets like the new one
from LSI Logic should simplify the Sparcstation clone equation, but with the
seven-chip set costing $1300+ (per set) in thousand quantities, it is unlikely 
that a Sparcstation clone will approach the price of an A3000 in an equivalent
configuration (memory and disk) for some time, especially once the A3000 has 
been out for a while and begins to be available substantially discounted from 
its current retail price.

Don't forget, either, that an entry-level Amiga that is highly compatible with
the A3000 is only $500.  That gives us an economy of scale for software that
no non-PC-volume workstation is ever likely to approach.

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