Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!pepper!cmcmanis
From: cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: AMIX?
Message-ID: <50356@sun.uucp>
Date: 21 Apr 88 17:53:45 GMT
References: <466@mailrus.cc.umich.edu> <863@gethen.UUCP> <391@brambo.UUCP> <49800@sun.uucp> <396@brambo.UUCP>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: cmcmanis@sun.UUCP (Chuck McManis)
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
Lines: 33
Keywords: Amiga AMIX Unix

In article <49800@sun.uucp> I wrote :
> IF IT WAS POSSIBLE TO MAKE A DISKFULL UNIX WORKSTATION FOR < $8K 
> TODAY WE (Sun) WOULD! 
Sorry to shout like that.

In article <396@brambo.UUCP> (Morgan W. Jones) replied:
> For under $4000 (this is accurate as far as I know) you could run a
> 386 clone with full SysV.

Ok folks, I may get flamed for this but hey what's life for anyway.
The problem comes when we get down to brass tacks and define what
a "workstation" is. In my lexicon a workstation has 4 megabytes of
memory, 1M pixels (optionally in color), 80Meg+ of disk space, UNIX*
in some form or another, and a window system in system in some form or
another. Ideally, it also has built in networking.

Intel took the initiative to build this exact beast, given the parts
they made and some of the parts that others made, and came up with a
'386 box with 4 meg of ram, running System V and X11, with an 80Meg
drive, and a Blit board and nice 1K x 1K monochrome monitor. Guess
what? It cost *them* $8,192 , you and me it would cost $11,264 - $12,288
dollars. Sure, you can run UNIX on an AT clone with probably less memory
and an EGA card, but it wouldn't be a workstation in my book. So the
next time someone argues that they can build a workstation for cheap
try meeting those design specs, and see if it is still cheap. This 
other thing you have to keep in mind is that it *must* be available
*now*, no fair saying "well, by december this 80Meg drive will only be
$200." ok?


--Chuck McManis
uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis   BIX: cmcmanis  ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com
These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.