Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!dg!dg-rtp.dg.com!ahughes From: ahughes@dg-rtp.dg.com (Arch Hughes) Newsgroups: comp.sys.m88k Subject: Re: Aviion and others? Message-ID: <1014@dg.dg.com> Date: 3 Oct 90 19:35:15 GMT References: <1990Sep27.133938.7662@unx.sas.com> <41775@mips.mips.COM> <4701@turquoise.UUCP> <1533@ftc.framentec.fr> Sender: root@dg.dg.com Reply-To: ahughes@dg-rtp.dg.com (Arch Hughes) Organization: Data General Corporation, Research Triangle Park, NC Lines: 30 In article <1533@ftc.framentec.fr>, ndoduc@framentec.fr (Nhuan Doduc) writes: |> Lately there is an article in Unix World (or Review ?) about Why the 88K |> has lost the Workstation market (...) |> |> Do you have any comment on this ? |> |> --nh |> Nhuan DODUC, |> Framentec-Cognitech, Paris, France, ndoduc@framentec.fr or ndoduc@cognitech.fr, |> Association Francaise des Utilisateurs d'Unix, France, doduc@afuu.fr The article was almost entirely non technical and was more correctly about why Motorolla lost the WS market (not the 88k). In sort, it says that M waited too long to get the product to market. M retorts that it waited longer to get a better product to market (saying, either directly or by inference that SPARK and MIPS traded of value for time to market). I think that only time will indicate whose right. Certainly SPARK is doing well, the i860, MIPS (even with DEC), and the 88k seem to be also-rans in a confusing market. It's sort of like the old story about the marketing of "Dove" soap. That market wasn't felt to be knowledgeable enough to appreciate the value of a ph neutral soap. Is the computer market smart enough to understand the trade offs in the MIPs wars, or are the looking for something more than technical prowess and MIPS/$ ratios when the mass market goes shopping?