Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!ames!amdcad!amd!intelca!oliveb!sun!rainier!dchen From: dchen@rainier.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: More on Byte Benchmarks Message-ID: <25708@sun.uucp> Date: Fri, 14-Aug-87 21:57:30 EDT Article-I.D.: sun.25708 Posted: Fri Aug 14 21:57:30 1987 Date-Received: Sun, 16-Aug-87 08:57:50 EDT References: <170@lakesys.UUCP> <1304@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> Sender: news@sun.uucp Lines: 39 Summary: My two bits on benchmarking First of all, all of the benchmarking I have seen comparing the '020 to the '386 has been pretty lame. Everything (so far, I should say. Optimism in action...) is either a) biased on purpose (run by Motorola or Intel), b) biased by accident (i.e., comparing a real machine against a paper machine, or comparing radically different configurations), or c) pretty useless (millions of nops per second, mega-linpack-i'm-sorry-but-99%- of-comp.sys.mac-inverts-less-than-one-matrix-a-year-anyway, megachars- compared-to-a-null-string-per-second, etc.). Most benchmarks commit more than one of the above. I suspect most people's interest in benchmarking is not based on a need to answer the question 'how should I design my next microprocessor' (In which case bus-cycles-per-light-furlong is probably an interesting statistic) but instead on the question 'gee, I wonder how fast a '386 box feels? I wonder just how well a Mac II justifies the cost difference over a Mac +/-? I'm going to write a CPU-bound program to do , which machine should I buy?' Another words, it's the application speed that matters. So I kinda sorta think that an application benchmark would be pretty interesting. You know, Word on a Mac II, Word on a Compaq '386. Excel. PageMaker (I heard somewhere that the first PageMaker release running running on a '386 was slower than on a Mac Plus. Hey, it's just a rumor, don't believe it til you see it yourself). Anyway, I think the jury is pretty far out right now. We'll start to get the results when the applications start getting ported, til then, well, I think the two machines, running with the same speed DRAMs and compiler technology, run at about the same speed. My personal bias is that Motorola machines can be made to run faster (the 25 MHz '020 beat the 20 MHz '386 to market by about a year) if you've got the bucks for a serious cache or fast memories, and that the 030 will tip the scales to Motorola's side, around the end of '88. Don't hold your breath for the '486 to come out, I hear they're trying to get it to support Ada in silicon :-) And, yes, I do think comp.sys.mac is an appropriate forum for benchmarking discussions. Applications tend to dominate in this industry, but speed is important too. Also, the software markets are beginning to converge, or at least overlap, so that we are beginning to have a choice (Make Mine Mac). David Chenevert