What differentiates a Workstation from a PC (Re: What should GNU run on (was Re: what kinds of things . . .))

[Gregory Kemnitz]

Software for personal computers (MS-DOS machines, Macs, Amigas) tends to cost
generally less than one thousand dollars for all but the most super-duper
special purpose software.  However, virtually everything for 'workstations'
is atrociously expensive in comparison, if the software exists at all.

It seems that virtually every piece of software available for workstations
is stuff to facilitate hardware or software development in one way or another.
There is almost no general-purpose (non-techie) software for workstations,
and what little there is costs thousands.

Does software with a decent user interface other than clocks and calculators
even exist on workstations for less than $5K??  While it is true that prices
quoted for low-end workstations are about the same as high-end PC's, to get a
truly usable workstation (big disk, memory, software if it exists) system
easily doubles or triples the base price, while to get a fully-featured PC the
investment may multiply the basic price by 1.5 or so.

----------------------------------+--------------------------------------
Greg Kemnitz                      | Software without hardware is an idea.
kemnitz at Convergent.COM            | Hardware without software is a space heater.
soon:				  |
kemnitz at postgres.berkeley.edu     | --Unknown author