Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!portal!cup.portal.com!jxh
From: jxh@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Sun 386i Road Runner Impressions
Message-ID: <5567@cup.portal.com>
Date: 18 May 88 01:23:48 GMT
References: <555@helios.toronto.edu> <5007@cup.portal.com> <1504@edison.GE.COM>
Distribution: na
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
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XPortal-User-Id: 1.1001.4342

jpl@edison.GE.COM (Pim Little) writes:

>Does anyone know if the hardware architecture of the Sun 386i is 
>proprietary to SUN?  Or could it possibly be compatible to Compaq
>386 world?

I think the frame buffer is the hardest thing to duplicate exactly.
It needs to be 768x1024, and 10 bits deep!  I don't know if anyone is making
such a display adapter, but I'm sure quite a bit of the software that runs
on the Sun386i depends on the existence of such a display at certain
addresses.  Also, using the I/O Channel to talk to such a board would 
probably be much slower than putting it directly on the CPU bus, as in the
Sun.

I also suspect there are other differences in hardware, but if you buy the
sources you should be able to overcome them.  In short, it should be
possible, but I think it would be highly ambitious.

Legal matters will probably intervene.  Sun makes their OS to sell their
machines.  I think it is impossible, and will continue to be so, to obtain
a binary license without buying the hardware, let alone a source license.
If I were you, I'd just buy the Sun machine and get on with it.  The
prices seem steep compared to stripped-down 386 clones, but when you look at
what you get (including the OS) the Sun386i is quite competitive (assuming
you were going to put all those things into your 386 clone eventually anyway).

-Jim Hickstein, VSAT Systems, Inc., San Jose CA
jxh@cup.portal.com   ...!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!jxh