Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!samsung!munnari.oz.au!uhccux!tholen
From: tholen@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (David Tholen)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: OS/2 2.0 !  Check it out before judging it...
Message-ID: <12938@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu>
Date: 9 May 91 09:41:22 GMT
Organization: University of Hawaii
Lines: 16

In article <12912@aggie.ucdavis.edu>, s142029@fred.ucdavis.edu writes:

>     I suppose speed doesn't matter to you.  Then why use faster machines.  
> Why use a 386 when the 286 exist ?  Why use computers when you can do it
> by hand ?  And if you say a difference of 30 seconds is not important, let's
> consider this :  A typical 386 machine executes about 4 millions instructions
> per second.  In 30 seconds, that would be 120 MIPS....  And how small is 
> 120 MIPS...  You better study your algorithm analysis class again ! :).

Um, 4 million instructions per second (MIPS) times 30 seconds is 120 million
instructions (MI), not 120 MIPS.  And whether a difference of 30 seconds is
important or not depends on how long the job took.  If it was 31 seconds
under Windows and 1 second under OS/2, that's impressive, but if it was
3000 seconds under Windows and 2970 under OS/2, then the 30 seconds difference
isn't all that important (one percent speedup).  I would have preferred to
see the percentage increase in speed rather than a time difference.