Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!ucselx!bionet!agate!sandstorm.Berkeley.EDU!dburr From: dburr@sandstorm.Berkeley.EDU (Donald Burr) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc Subject: Re: SGIL "Fast Math" Init Message-ID: <1991Apr30.113431.29192@agate.berkeley.edu> Date: 30 Apr 91 11:34:31 GMT Sender: root@agate.berkeley.edu (Charlie Root) Organization: ucb Lines: 51 In article writes: >n >From: barvian@ece.cmu.edu (Scott Barvian) >Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc >Subject: Re: SGIL "Fast Math" Init >Message-ID: >Date: 30 Apr 91 03:15:30 GMT >References: <1991Apr30.005107.26755@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> >Sender: news@fs7.ece.cmu.edu (USENET News System) >Organization: ECE Dept., Carnegie-Mellon University >Lines: 26 >In-Reply-To: jch1@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu's message of 30 Apr 91 00:51:07 GMT > >> Could someone please tell me where the SGIL "Fast Math" Init is located >> on mac.archive.umich.edu? > >I started this, so hopefully I can finish it too. I've answered this question >around 10 times today... > >The path to the SGIL init is >(drum roll please) > >.../archive/mac/system.extensions/init/ffpacc.sit.hqx > >I know, you're saying "Isn't it obvious?" now, right? I think "ffpacc" >stands for "fast floating point accelerator". > >If you start using this and find some definite speed-ups, please post your >experiences. My suspicion is that it will work well with some applications >and will crash others! > >Since it was written in '88, I'm very curious to know why I've never heard it >mentioned before, if it's as great as it seems. Perhaps an entire past >civilization used it, found its problems and it just faded away. > >Or maybe not. >-- >==== Scott Barvian ============ Department of Electrical/Computer Eng. === >==== barvian@ece.cmu.edu ====== Carnegie Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA === I've never had it *CRASH* on me, but it does tend to muck up the mathematics a bit, which can really hurt you if you're doing lot of spreadsheet calculations where even the *SLIGHTEST* error will throw everything off. For example, I was doing my finances in Microsoft Excel, and noticed some roundoff errors, and also it didn't get some dates correct (when I type in a date in a Date formatted cell, it comes out wrong.) =============================================================================== Donald Burr, Univ. of California,Berkeley | America Online: DonaldBurr INTERNET: dburr@ocf.Berkeley.EDU |_Compu$erve:_72540,3071_____________ or: 72540.3071@compuserve.COM | "Send flames to /dev/null."