The Perfect Computer - 36 bits?
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From: Steve O'Hara-Smith on 29 Mar 2007 10:20 On Thu, 29 Mar 07 12:30:28 GMT jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > And some of that work was done by JMF, the other half of my > username. It took those with TOPS-10 experience to cause VMS > to evolve to be an OS that was useful. And it took Microsoft to perform the opposite of incremental development on it to produce the useless POS it has evolved into. -- C:>WIN | Directable Mirror Arrays The computer obeys and wins. | A better way to focus the sun You lose and Bill collects. | licences available see | http://www.sohara.org/
From: Stephen Fuld on 29 Mar 2007 11:42 jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > In article <571ro8F2bdosvU1(a)mid.individual.net>, > =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan_Vorbr=FCggen?= <jvorbrueggen(a)not-mediasec.de> wrote: >>> Only for small problems. What do you do in the cases where a >>> reassembly is the way to make the problem go away? >> Do a complete SYSGEN? > > Yes. Was there no alternative between patching the object code and doing a complete sysgen? On the system with which I am most familiar (Non-DEC), we mostly did partial sysgens where only a small number of modules were re-assembled and the system linked. Out of say 400 modules in the OS, a typical gen might assemble half a dozen and a large one perhaps a hundred. We did full gens (all elements), very rarely. -- - Stephen Fuld (e-mail address disguised to prevent spam)
From: Andrew Swallow on 29 Mar 2007 13:12 jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > In article <6meeue.322.ln(a)via.reistad.name>, > Morten Reistad <first(a)last.name> wrote: [snip] >> Lastest pc press blurbs. Vista only runs around 80 of 150 >> identified critical XP applications. > > So can we make a reasonable assumption that the load tests > involved all games and not critical apps? Or the games were written in the last 2 years and developed on the beta version of Vista. Andrew Swallow
From: Andrew Swallow on 29 Mar 2007 13:17 Jan Vorbr�ggen wrote: >> Real-world, but your second question is very relevant. The VAX was >> relatively constant in performance between workloads, but the Alpha >> varied by an incredible factor (ten or more, on practical workloads). > > Yes, and that is a very valid comment. I think there was some COBOL > program where the VAX was faster than the Alpha, but I don't remember > whether it was translated or recompiled (the latter case would be even > more surprising). > > I think the factor of 2 came from the benchmark workload that DEC used > to define "VAX MIPS", so it was actually geared towards the VAX. On > anything to do with floating point, the Alpha was much faster. > > Jan Did the Alpha have a BCD add instruction? If not the shifting and masking to add 4 bits at a time would be very slow. Andrew Swallow
From: krw on 29 Mar 2007 13:57
In article <eug9l1$8qk_002(a)s879.apx1.sbo.ma.dialup.rcn.com>, jmfbahciv(a)aol.com says... > In article <56srafF2arjf6U1(a)mid.individual.net>, > Del Cecchi <cecchinospam(a)us.ibm.com> wrote: > >Morten Reistad wrote: > >> In article <56qh33F29t3i0U1(a)mid.individual.net>, > >> Del Cecchi <cecchinospam(a)us.ibm.com> wrote: > >> > >>>Andrew Swallow wrote: > >>> > >>>>jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > >>>> > >>>> > >>>>>In article <Vf-dnSMExMAU4JvbnZ2dneKdnZydnZ2d(a)bt.com>, > >>>>> Andrew Swallow <am.swallow(a)btopenworld.com> wrote: > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>>>jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > >>>>>> > >>>>>> > >>>>>>>In article <rqh3ue.6m61.ln(a)via.reistad.name>, > >>>>>>> Morten Reistad <first(a)last.name> wrote: > >>>>>> > >>>>>>[snip] > >>>>>> > >>>>>> > >>>>>>>>The decision of May 17th 1983 couldn't have been much different. > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>After all, people want to upgrade their computers in the most > >>>>>>>>>effective way possible - and the most effective way is the one that > >>>>>>>>>requires them to spend the least money converting their own programs > >>>>>>>>>and data. > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>So if nobody makes PDP-10 computers any more, there's no particular > >>>>>>>>>benefit to their owners doing their next upgrade with DEC - and a > >>>>>>>>>motive not to do so, so as to punish this behavior. > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>Under what circumstances would abandoning their 10 and 20 > >>>>>>>>>customers be > >>>>>>>>>rational? > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>This is where I have an issue with DEC. It was the abandonment of the > >>>>>>>>customers. > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>>No, no. _PDP-10_ customers. This was Bell's doing through and > >>>>>>>through. > >>>>>> > >>>>>>Worse DEC dropped the PDP-11 customers, > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>>Sigh! Now _when_ are you talking about. This was not true in > >>>>>the early 80s. When the PDP-11 product line was sold off, Bell > >>>>>was long gone. > >>>> > >>>> > >>>>There is no law that bans a company from repeating the same mistake. > >>>> > >>>> > >>>>>>LSI-11 customers, PDP-8 > >>>>>>customers and the VAX/VMS customers. Eventually the company runs > >>>>>>out of customers. > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>>You are talking about the 90s when the plan was to strip the company > >>>>>down to its help desk, which is the only piece that Compaq wanted. > >>>>> > >>>>>What is really sad is that they trashed it and then HP seems to have > >>>>>completed the job. > >>>>>/BAH > >>> > >>>They probably would have run out of pdp-8 and pdp-11 customers sooner or > >>>later. And by the early 80's I would think those systems were in the > >>>down part of the lifecycle. > >> > >> > >> LSI11 based support systems everywhere could have made the mainframes > >> last until the 8600 was out, and could have assisted in a transition. > >> > >> Perhaps. Prime tried this strategy, but got bought out and gutted midway > >> in the process. > >> > >> DEC _did_ come back with the alpha, just as soon as they had managed > >> to deVAXify their brains. Except, by then the trust in the company had > >> evaporated. > >> > >> Snake oil, may 17th and all that. > >> > >> We keep harping on this. I have wondered why. I think this is a discussion > >> of today's dangers by proxy. > >> > >> The important lesson from the events is that you should never, ever > >> have a single source for the equipment that runs your business critical > >> systems. Even if it is DEC, IBM, HP or a similar blue-chip giant. > >> > >> Because even DEC folded on us. Not as spectacularly as International > >> Harvester a century before, but enough to shake us all. > >> > >> DEC was a company with a reputation far ahead of today's HP or Microsoft. > >> Somewhat like a reconsituted IBM of today, or Intel, or Apple. These > companies > >> are/were blue-chip giants that constitute a core of IT technology. > >> > >> But the lesson is that if DEC can implode, so can they. > >> > >> The lesser ones all imploded. Wang, Prime, Norsk Data, ICL, Honeywell, > >> NCR, Siemens, DG and more all imploded in that decade. In our guts, > >> we kind of expected somesuch to happen. It was DEC that shook us. > >> > >> Today we wouldn't be much shaken if HP/Compaq, Dell, Lenovo, TCI, Via, Sun, > >> or even AMD implodes. It will be momentarily painful for us as customers, > >> but we will migrate elsewhere. Workers and PHB's can follow the business > >> that moves without too much trouble. > >> > >> It is when outfits like Apple, IBM, Intel or Microsoft folds that we > >> are shaken, all of us. > >> > >> The lesson from DEC is that it can happen. > >> > >> Always have a Plan B. > >> > >> -- mrr > > > >Note that IBM damn near folded in the early 90's as well during the last > >days of the reign of John Akers. > > Of course. IIRC, IBM had a crisis in the 80s(?); the reason it > survived that one was due to having enough money to carry them > through. > The '70s were pretty bad. I remember walking out to the P'ok production floor and seeing only one or two processors in final test with "Departent of Agriculture" (going to a three-letter government agency, sure) in the '70s. The 303x came out in '80 and things were hopping around P'ok, at least, for the next decade. -- Keith |