Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!husc6!rutgers!columbia!cubsun!shenkin
From: shenkin@cubsun.BIO.COLUMBIA.EDU (Peter Shenkin)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Software vs Hardware BitBlt (was: Self Modifying Code)
Message-ID: <69@cubsun.BIO.COLUMBIA.EDU>
Date: 27 Jul 88 15:37:58 GMT
References: <789@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> <1988Jul26.145106.5459@utzoo.uucp>
Reply-To: shenkin@cubsun.UUCP (Peter Shenkin)
Organization: Dept. of Biology, Columbia Univ., New York, NY
Lines: 24

In article <1988Jul26.145106.5459@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <789@amethyst.ma.arizona.edu> chris@spock (Chris Ott) writes:
>>     I wouldn't be so sure. Where I work, we have both IRISes and Suns. The
>>Suns have software graphics and the IRISes have hardware graphics. [The
>>Irises are faster for polygon graphics.]
>Believe me, I know this; we have an Iris too.  Have you *priced* the
>difference, though? ....
>...For the price of the Iris graphics hardware, you could do a lot more to
>a 68020 than just boost the clock speed a few MHz.

OK, if you're comparing Sun-3's with Iris 3130's.  But let's look at Sun-4's
and Iris 4D machines (based on the MIPS chip);  both lines start around $60k, 
I believe, but from what I've heard, the low-end 4D's are excellent scalar
machines, giving about 7 mips, and you get this great graphics hardware to
boot -- for free, so to speak.  

Caveat:  I have experience with neither machine.  Obviously, the folks I
know who've been using 4D's have been very impressed.  The comparison
with Sun-4's comes from them.  Contrary opinions welcomed!
-- 
*******************************************************************************
Peter S. Shenkin,    Department of Biological Sciences,    Columbia University,
New York, NY   10027         Tel: (212) 280-5517 (work);  (212) 829-5363 (home)
shenkin@cubsun.bio.columbia.edu    shenkin%cubsun.bio.columbia.edu@cuvmb.BITNET