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From: sysmgr@King.eng.umd.edu (Doug Mohney)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: IBM RISC
Message-ID: <00932EE3.3C66F260@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU>
Date: 27 Feb 90 17:11:48 GMT
References: <8064@pt.cs.cmu.edu>,<9327@portia.Stanford.EDU>
Sender: news@eng.umd.edu (The News System)
Reply-To: sysmgr@King.eng.umd.edu (Doug Mohney)
Organization: Univ. of Maryland CAD Lab
Lines: 45

>IBM has a couple of things going for it.
>1.  The 6000 has the IBM logo.  (This was one reason often presented for
>    IBM's success with the IBM PC.)
>2.  The 6000 is significantly better (i.e. faster) than the competition.
>3.  The 6000 has the backing of a large sales and support network.
>
You left out:
 4.  IBM went to the time and trouble to get a large base of third-party
     software running on their platforms
 5.  IBM got "real UNIX" compatability, in the form of Berkley/POSIX and NFS
     stuff. 
 6.  MicroChannel provides an upgun to co/multiprocessing, plus lots of
     boards developed for the PS/2 world.

>SUN and MIPS have a couple of things against them.
>1.  Their machines are slower than the 6000.

Both DEC/MIPS and Sun haven't put their cards on the table yet. They are
rumored to release 20 MIPS boxes by May, and bring something (current product
line?) in under 10K/box; IBM's entry-level machine is 13K. If DEC and/or Sun
come out with 10 MIPS/5K-7K boxes to complement their 20K/10-12K boxes, life
gets very interesting. 

>Are we going to see a replay of the Apple II vs. IBM pc situation in
>the early 80s?  
>...
>Here we have SUN and MIPS, the companies that first came out with
>good RISC machines (like Apple that first came out with a good
>personal computer--much better than the TRS-80 8^) ).  hmmmm....
>

IBM's machines will promote UNIX/workstation concepts, but it remains to be
see if IBM can continue to perform technology upgunning year after year. The
PS/2 lines are overpriced and stagnant, while Compaq and various other PC-clone
makers have bigger market share than IBM. 

Finally, the workstation market is inheritantly competitive. Before IBM
jumped into the fray, DEC, Sun and HP/Apollo were/are having a blood battle
of MIPS/bucks.

Look for IBM to take 7-10% of existing marketshare due to price/performance
over the next two years, and for them to grab up to 50% of whatever more
market which they create by their announcement.

The speculative math is left as an exercise to the reader :-)