jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Joseph N. Hall) (09/26/89)
From this month's MIPS: "A 25-MHz Am29000 brings powerful number crunching to Apple's NuBus machines" "...besting even a workstation like the DECstation 3100 in Dryhstones and offering workstation-like performance in floating-point operations." Currently there's only a "C" compiler for the board, and you have to compile, link, etc., from a shell window. You can run an executable file by double-clicking its icon. The card is the NuSuper coprocessor board from YARC Systems (5655 lindero Canyon Road Suite 721, Westlake Village, CA 91362 ph. (818) 889-4388), and it runs about $6000 after you buy the card, compiler, and associated goodies. This caught my eye because of the persistent rumors that Apple is developing an Am29000 machine, and is, I guess, an indication of the kind of number- crunching capability such a "Mac" might have. To wit: Drhy/sec MFLOPS (sing) (dbl) -- Linpack YARC NuSuper 22230 2.166 1.416 Mac IIx 4060 .067 .076 DECstation 3100 15002 2.124 .930 Compaq 386/33 16000 .538 .426 The Mac IIx's miserable floating-point performance is a little TOO miserable, and I think the reviewer's benchmark must have used the coprocessor indirectly via SANE, which will indeed slow things down mightily. Pleasant dreams! v v sssss|| joseph hall || 4116 Brewster Drive v v s s || jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Internet) || Raleigh, NC 27606 v sss || SP Software/CAD Tool Developer, Mac Hacker and Keyboardist -----------|| Disclaimer: NCSU may not share my views, but is welcome to.