4.2BSD on uVaxII ??

[David Herron, NPR Lover]

In article <391 at bu-cs.UUCP>, root at bu-cs.UUCP (Barry Shein) writes:
> I guess what I am more or less confused about is, why are people buying
> microvaxes? I can think of only a few reasons:
> 
> 	1. You run VMS, so you got no choices (you fool.)

Sorry, we don't do that ...

> 	2. DEC is giving them to you for free or nearly (good reason.)

Not this either ... NSF grant.

> 	3. You have significant applications that require
> 	the architecture specifically (macro code, q-bus periphs)

Actually ... We have a lot of applications that are large and compute
bound (Macsyma comes to mind).  They don't need bus bandwidth that much.
(i.e. we won't run ingres on this machine, or not much anyway).

> 	4. You have great expectations for the box.

Yes ... I expect the CPU to be most of a -780.  And for a tiny fraction
of the cost.  Enabling us to buy a number of these machines.

> Seems from my analysis they are slower and more expensive than similar
> 68K boxes and promise to remain so for years, especially I/O (rumour has
> it that some of the 68020s will be approaching the compute speed of the
> 8600 for about 2% (20K/1M) the price this fall.) Other 32-bit processors
> (3B2 etc) have a similar outlook.

The problem with 68K machines is that there aren't any *real* versions
of Unix available for them yet.  Ask again in a couple of weeks though.
We have the Motorola port of System V that AT&T is distributing.  And
are trying to get it to work on a compupro 68K machine.  Then we'll be
able to say how good it is.  But with System V we don't have ethernet
capability off the shelf.  Not like we do with a uVaxII running 4.2.
At least that's the hope.

Actually I'd like to see a 68020 machine that runs as fast as you claim.
I'd like to port 4.2 to it.  It'd be a screaming machine.

> especially when DEC loves to tell you they can't fix it cuz it's UNIX.
HA!  See my posting the other day about the rev 7 upgrade? :-)
-- 
--- David Herron
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