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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!polaris!josh
From: josh@polaris.UUCP (Josh Knight)
Newsgroups: net.arch,net.micro.att
Subject: Re: AT&T MIPS claim
Message-ID: <557@polaris.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 5-Jun-86 02:06:12 EDT
Article-I.D.: polaris.557
Posted: Thu Jun  5 02:06:12 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 6-Jun-86 04:56:16 EDT
References: <577@scirtp.UUCP> <1633@mtuxo.UUCP>
Reply-To: josh@polaris.UUCP (Josh Knight)
Organization: IBM Research, Yorktown Heights, N.Y.
Lines: 19
Keywords: PC Vax
Xref: linus net.arch:3074 net.micro.att:1272
Summary: Stranger things have happened

In article <1633@mtuxo.UUCP> hsc@mtuxo.UUCP (h.cohen) writes:
>> I just read some trade rag that had an ad in it from Ma Bell about
>>the UNIX PC.  They made this interesting claim that the UNIX PC gives
>>you "75% of the power of a VAX 11/780" for "only 7% of the cost".
>>...
>The comparison was made with 512K of memory and a 10MB disk in each
>machine :-)

When the Vax 11/780 (1980?) I first used was installed it had 512K
of memory and 80Mb of disk.  The recompilation of 4.0(?) BSD Unix that
the installation documentation said would take 20 minutes took 8 hours.
Never did figure exactly why. Didn't seem to be thrashing.  Definitely
would NOT support 20 people (one person ^f'ing on vi brought the machine
to its knees).  My memory is the configuration cost about $150K.
It was a pretty nice PC, but I could tell when anyone else logged on.
-- 

	Josh Knight, IBM T.J. Watson Research
 josh@ibm.com, josh@yktvmh.bitnet,  ...!philabs!polaris!josh