Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!+ From: dpm@cs.cmu.edu (David Maynard) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: Workstations for Lisp Message-ID: Date: 11 Jun 89 18:44:00 GMT References: <486@unipas.fmi.uni-passau.de>, <5187@pt.cs.cmu.edu> Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA Lines: 24 In-Reply-To: <5187@pt.cs.cmu.edu> ram@wb1.cs.cmu.edu (Rob MacLachlan) writes: > -- How fast are the disks? Even with lots of memory you will page. I don't have direct experience, but recent Sun-Spots (comp.sys.sun) articles have indicated that the SparcStation is significantly better at disk I/O than the DECStation 3100. (Gee, could that DMA be paying off?) However, these same articles indicate that the 3100 can be significantly better for number crunching. I suspect that part of the difference here is the "quality" of the math libraries. It seems to take more work to make a Sun run math codes faster. I'm sure the 3100 does have a raw speed advantage, I'm just not sure it is as great as some people have reported. I believe that more AI software is currently available for the Suns. Sun has had longer to build an AI base. It is likely that DEC will try to close this gap though. --- David P. Maynard (dpm@cs.cmu.edu) Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University --- These are my opinions. I haven't asked CMU what our official opinion is.