Path: utzoo!utgpu!cunews!bnrgate!brtph3!brchh104!brchs1!bnr.ca!rice.edu!sun-spots-request
From: davecb@nexus.yorku.ca (David Collier-Brown)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun
Subject: Re: Sun Rivals Blast SPARCstation 2 in UNIX TODAY!
Keywords: Miscellaneous
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Date: 8 Dec 90 00:52:00 GMT
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jcd@dopsa.att.com (Jack C Dixon) writes:
| On page 88 of the Nov 12 issue of Unix Today there is an article titled
| "Sun Rivals Blast SPARCstation 2".  I'll list a few quotes from the
| article and hopefully someone out there familiar with the SPARC
| architecture will comment on their accuracy.

| "... program manager at HP/Apollo, noted that the SPARC chip appears to
| have reached its limits to growth.  'They're running that thing at 40 MHz
| generating 28 MIPS.  That's anemic.  That's bad.  That's terrible.' ...
| 'With Sun having that standardized SPARC, that hurt them.  They can't
| innovate, and that chip is not very efficient.'"

Interestingly enough, that was one of the myths attacked by Howard Lee of
Sun when speaking at the University of Toronto last week.  To
oversimplify, he said that everyone was hitting technology limits with
particular implementations/micro-archetectures.  Their competitors using
Harvard architectures were hitting limits around 25mhz, Sun were pushing
it at 33mhz.

The answers were simple: spend money.  Sun was spending it on bi-cmos and
multiprocessors (n <= 4) and other, longer-term experiments, plus
shortening the time-to-system after first silicon, which they saw as a
serious industry-wide problem.  They had been spending it on ecl, but that
looked like it would be overtaken by other technologies before it could
get to market.

David Collier-Brown,  | davecb@Nexus.YorkU.CA, ...!yunexus!davecb or
72 Abitibi Ave.,      | {toronto area...}lethe!dave or just
Willowdale, Ontario,  | postmaster@{nexus.}yorku.ca
CANADA. 416-223-8968  | work phone (416) 736-5257 x 22075