Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncrcae!hubcap!gatech!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!pasteur!agate!labrea!decwrl!pyramid!prls!philabs!micomvax!ray
From: ray@micomvax.UUCP (Ray Dunn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: 386SX for PC/AT
Keywords: 386SX, AT
Message-ID: <1550@micomvax.UUCP>
Date: 14 Dec 88 21:09:07 GMT
References: <1031@logico.UUCP>
Reply-To: ray@micomvax.UUCP (Ray Dunn)
Organization: Philips Electronics Ltd. (TDS - Montreal) St. Laurent QC, Canada
Lines: 29

In article <1031@logico.UUCP> gary@logico.UUCP (Gary Vrooman) writes:
>....has announced a 386SX card for the PC/AT.
>....but [it] only provides roughly a 15% speedup over an AT.

The 386SX should *not* be regarded as a performance enhancer over 286
machines, indeed at the same clock speed, the 386SX performs slower than a
286.

The 386SX is only cost-effective (if at all) as the low end of the 386
family - running 386 based software - rather than the high end of the 286
family running 80286 or 8088 based code.

The 386SX provides extra functionality over the 286, not extra performance.

The 386SX is what the 80286 *should* have been, and allows you to run full
blown protected UNIX etc, and, eventually, the 386 version of OS/2.

Moral: Don't buy a 386SX machine to run DOS!

>The card that we all really want for $600 would include an 82385 cache
>controller and 32K of static RAM.

At 16Mhz, this would have an insignificant affect on the performance.

-- 
Ray Dunn.                      |   UUCP: ..!philabs!micomvax!ray
Philips Electronics Ltd.       |   TEL : (514) 744-8200   Ext: 2347
600 Dr Frederik Philips Blvd   |   FAX : (514) 744-6455
St Laurent. Quebec.  H4M 2S9   |   TLX : 05-824090