leein@uicsrd.csrd.uiuc.edu (07/02/88)
My friend asked me to post the following message. Please direct your
response to
song@uispg.csl.uiuc.edu
--------------------------------------------------------
Since I posted a message( GATHER, and Say NO to MCA), I have received
several mails and responses.
I expected that I would receive a lot of responses of pro-non-MCA.
Surprisingly, there are still some people that think that AT bus is
enough or, even further, some people who responded as " What's wrong
with MCA?"
(1) <@RELAY.CS.NET,@usf.edu:whitley@usf.edu> emailed to me:
> You don't seem to realize
> that IBM is willing, and has, granted other corporations license to
> use the Micro Channel Architecture. Why bother attempting to cut a
> new path in the forest when good old IBM is bull dozing a way for you?
> Besides, what's wrong with IBM anyway? For business their systems
> are unparalleled, due to both excellent service capability, and IBM's
> ability to meet any computing needs, from PS/2's to the 30xx series.
I cannot even think of any comment for this. For those people who
have the same opinion as Whitley's, Don Gillies' response may be a
good learning.
(2) Don Gillies, Dept. of CS, U of Ill., wrote:
> I am disturbed by the new cleverness of IBM, which (it seems
> to me) always aims for total world domination (computational
> dictatorship). IBM has:
> (1) Designed a mediocre bus & patented many parts of it to squash
> competition.
> (2) Intimidated companies into paying back-royalties
> (4) Contracted for a Vaper/OS/2 reminiscent of OS/360 in overblown
> dimension.
That's right. PC business is a quite different kind of business.
The market momentum, patent, the copyright law, and the existing software
basis(!) makes one and only one company easily monopolize the market.
Imagine IBM's greed and a horrible world in which only IBM sells all
of the PCs for the world. It was possible to break long-distance-telephone
monopoly in TEN years. But even the legislators cannot break computer
monopoly unless they break patent and copyright law. It only drifts
along the wind.
(2) Peter Holzmann, Octopus Enterprises ( pete@octopus.UUCP ) did not
seem to realize the fact at first. He said:
> My conclusion: the clone-makers need to pick a 32-bit AT bus extension
> standard.
He changed his statement lately and it seems that he agrees with a whole
new bus such as NUBus.
Companies like Tektronix and YARC started to make RISC (m88000 and
AMD29000, respectively) coprocessor
board for the NUBus and they expressed that they have no intention to make
similar boards for the AT bus or MCA. I am glad to receive a pro response
from real engineers like Kegel and Rich.
(3) Dan Kegel (srs!dan@cs.rochester.edu rochester!srs!dan
dan%srs.uucp@harvard.harvard.edu) wrote :
> As a hardware and software engineer who deals with workstations, I am very
> excited by the prospect of a single bus for the major low-cost 32-bit
> workstations (the PC 386 and the Mac II); with only one bus to target,
> hardware designers would have an easier time getting to market, and buyers
> would have a better variety to choose from.
(4) rich@devvax.Jpl.Nasa.Gov wrote:
> Yes, you are right, the AT bus is the wrong solution for the
> 80386 chip. Besides only being 16 bits wide, the majority of the AT
> busses on the market run at 8 MHz!
Now we seem to agree on NUBus. Now the problem is compatibility with
the existing MS-DOS software. Aparently we need new MS-DOS 4.0(?). Still a
lot of eixisting softwares such as MS Windows/386 won't work at first.
So the solution is that all clone makers should agree on the new bus
they choose so that Microsoft cannot ignore new (NUBus) 386 machines.
Or one should make an AT bus emulation program similar to Soft-PC.
We will have the same problem with OS/2. But there is not much software for
OS/2 or UNIX/386. Compatibility for these OS's will not be a problem
as long as clone makers make their decision quickly.
Well, now clone makers seem to start to listen to customers like me.
On the first page of InfoWorld this week, AST President announced a plan
for a committee of clone makers for a new advanced bus (which is likely to
be NUBus). But still not many companies expressed interest in that effort.
So call clone makers and make them to participate in the committee.
Thanks
Hugh at song@uispg.csl.uiuc.edu