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From: kludge@gitpyr.gatech.EDU (Scott Dorsey)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Speed is the one true performance metric
Message-ID: <2647@gitpyr.gatech.EDU>
Date: Sun, 16-Nov-86 21:29:16 EST
Article-I.D.: gitpyr.2647
Posted: Sun Nov 16 21:29:16 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 17-Nov-86 07:04:47 EST
References: <1903@mmintl.UUCP> <12142@watnot.UUCP> <107@pembina.alberta.UUCP> <1913@mmintl.UUCP>
Reply-To: kludge@gitpyr.UUCP (Scott Dorsey)
Organization: Georgia College Of Universal Knowledge
Lines: 19

In article <1913@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes:
>A friend of mine who has used them tells me that when Crays go down, they
>tend to be down for periods measured in weeks, not hours or days.  Now tell
>me again that manufacturers don't trade off reliability and speed.

   When some machines go down, the manufacturer essentially comes out and
replaces the CPU board-by-board.  When DEC machines go down, DEC comes out
and uses software diagnostics to find the bad board, then goes into the truck
and pulls out a replacement.  Cray equipment is too expensive to keep such a
parts supply; you can't keep every possible board in the van like some other
companies do.  
   That's why it takes so long.  State of the art does not come without some
disadvantages.

-- 
Scott Dorsey
ICS Programming Lab (Where old terminals go to die),  Rich 110,
    Georgia Institute of Technology, Box 36681, Atlanta, Georgia 30332
    ...!{akgua,allegra,amd,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo,ut-ngp}!gatech!gitpyr!kludge