peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (08/13/89)
In article <36370@bu-cs.BU.EDU>, madd@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Jim Frost) writes: > THe only thing that differentiates a "PC" from a "workstation", so far as > I can tell, is... Whether or not the vendor supports the windowing system? -- Peter da Silva, Xenix Support, Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Business: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. | "The sentence I am now Personal: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' | writing is the sentence Quote: Have you hugged your wolf today? 'U` | you are now reading"
peter@ruuinf.cs.ruu.nl (Peter Sliepenbeek) (08/14/89)
In article <5665@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: > In article <36370@bu-cs.BU.EDU>, madd@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Jim Frost) writes: > > THe only thing that differentiates a "PC" from a "workstation", so far as > > I can tell, is... > that a PC still holds on to philosophies expressed in an 8-bit age while living in a 32-bit (64?) age, against the "eagerness" with which a workstation is equipped to make use of the newest technologies.
nagle@well.UUCP (John Nagle) (08/14/89)
The real difference, at this point, is the distribution channel. If the predominant distribution channel is through retailers, it's a personal computer. If the predominant distribution channel is through the manufacturer's sales reps, it's a workstation. The technology is irrelevant. John Nagle
davidsen@sungod.crd.ge.com (ody) (08/15/89)
It's a snob issue... a 386 running SysV, with X and NFS is a PC, but a
Sun 2/160 with the CPU of a programmable thermostat is a workstation.
The only consistent diference is that a "PC" comes standard with fewer
pixels on the display.
Price is important, too. If it doesn't cost a lot, it isn't a
workstation. I changed a "PC" from mono to 1024x768 color this weekend
for about $650, on a "real computer" it would cost about that for the new
cable (yes I'm joking ;-).
bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM)
{uunet | philabs}!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen
"Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -mefrank@croton.dec.com (Frank Wortner) (08/15/89)
In the long run, a workstation is whatever the marketing department of the manufacturer says it is. Likewise for PC's. Frank Disclaimer: The above is OBVIOUSLY my own personal opinion. :-)
datri@concave.uucp (Anthony A. Datri) (08/15/89)
== THe only thing that differentiates a "PC" from a "workstation", so far as == I can tell, is... =that a PC still holds on to philosophies expressed in an 8-bit age while =living in a 32-bit (64?) age, against the "eagerness" with which =a workstation is equipped to make use of the newest technologies. Personally, I find it difficult to call something running MS-DOS with a fairly low-res screen a workstation.
david@ics.COM (David B. Lewis) (08/15/89)
In article <1510@ruuinf.cs.ruu.nl<, peter@ruuinf.cs.ruu.nl (Peter Sliepenbeek) writes: < In article <5665@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: < > In article <36370@bu-cs.BU.EDU>, madd@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Jim Frost) writes: < > > THe only thing that differentiates a "PC" from a "workstation", so far as < > > I can tell, is... < > < < that a PC still holds on to philosophies expressed in an 8-bit age while < living in a 32-bit (64?) age, against the "eagerness" with which < a workstation is equipped to make use of the newest technologies. that you turn a PC off at night. -- David B. Lewis david@ics.com ics!david@buita.bu.edu david%ics.UUCP@buita.bu.edu "No, I'm a member of the X User's Group, not the Ex-User's Group."
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (08/15/89)
In article <1528@convex.UUCP>, datri@concave.uucp (Anthony A. Datri) writes: > Personally, I find it difficult to call something running MS-DOS with > a fairly low-res screen a workstation. How about something runing UNIX and X-windows with a 1K by 1K display? That's what you'll find in high-end PCs these days. -- Peter da Silva, Xenix Support, Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Business: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. | "The sentence I am now Personal: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' | writing is the sentence Quote: Have you hugged your wolf today? 'U` | you are now reading"
gaggy@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US (Gregory Gulik) (08/16/89)
In article <1528@convex.UUCP> datri@convex.com writes: >== THe only thing that differentiates a "PC" from a "workstation", so far as >== I can tell, is... >=that a PC still holds on to philosophies expressed in an 8-bit age while >=living in a 32-bit (64?) age, against the "eagerness" with which >=a workstation is equipped to make use of the newest technologies. > >Personally, I find it difficult to call something running MS-DOS with >a fairly low-res screen a workstation. Ok, get ready for Gaggy's definition of workstation: Workstation: A computer who's manufacturer is afraid of being sued by IBM for calling it a Personal Computer. 1/2 * 8^) Think about it, computer companies are having field day suing each other because "their product is too similar to our product, nyah, nyah". Therefor, someone had to make up a new name.. Ok, speaking of comparing 386's to a Sun 2/160. Just today I was comparing the load handling abilities of both. Guess what. I found that the Sun (who's dhrystone rating is 1/5th of the 386's) was able to handle a load almost as well as that "hot" 386... Face it, the 386 isn't the greatest when trying to do more than 1 thing at a time. -greg -- Gregory Gulik Phone: (312) 825-2435 E-Mail: ...!jolnet!gaggy || ...!chinet!gag || gulik@depaul.edu || gulik@iwlcs.att.com || variations thereof.
cjc@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Chris Calabrese[mav]) (08/16/89)
In article <5687@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: > In article <1528@convex.UUCP>, datri@concave.uucp (Anthony A. Datri) writes: > > Personally, I find it difficult to call something running MS-DOS with > > a fairly low-res screen a workstation. > > How about something runing UNIX and X-windows with a 1K by 1K display? > That's what you'll find in high-end PCs these days. I keep seeing references to graphics capabilities and to raw cpu power in this discussion, but I think people are overlooking one important aspect of the PC vs Workstations wars - the technology used to implement the display hardware. Most PC display adapter boards are simple memory maps between board hardware and the pixels on the screen. The main cpu is responsible for things such as bit-blitting, off-screen image copies (for things like fast popup menus), and color rectangle fills. In "workstations", either the graphics board can do many of these things itself (i.e. the Sun color framebuffers or the Silicon Graphics machines), or the workstation is only used for the display and keyboard functions (i.e. X server only workstations or the AT&T 630) and another machine is used for compute bound processing. In either of these events, the user level computation is seperated from the graphics level computation. A 25Mhz '386 AT&T box running X windows is slower than a Sun 3/60 running NeWS, yet the '386 has more raw cpu power. I believe this is due to the above mentioned differences in the way the graphics boards work. -- Name: Christopher J. Calabrese Brain loaned to: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ att!ulysses!cjc cjc@ulysses.att.com Obligatory Quote: ``Anyone who would tell you that would also try and sell you the Brooklyn Bridge.''
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (08/16/89)
In article <12035@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com>, cjc@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Chris Calabrese[mav]) writes: [ regarding PCs versus workstations] > Most PC display adapter boards are simple memory maps between board > hardware and the pixels on the screen. [ but workstations have graphics processors ] Sorry, but at least one of these display boards, the Bell Tech IWS, has a separate graphics processor. Also, one rather low end PC, the Commodore Amiga, does too. On the other hand if the CPU is fast enough it can move bits around faster than a framebuffer (just ask Henry Spencer). No, you have to use some other definition. -- Peter da Silva, Xenix Support, Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Business: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. | "The sentence I am now Personal: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' | writing is the sentence Quote: Have you hugged your wolf today? 'U` | you are now reading"
kemnitz@mitisft.Convergent.COM (Gregory Kemnitz) (08/16/89)
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@Convergent.COM | Hardware without software is a space heater. soon: | kemnitz@postgres.berkeley.edu | --Unknown author
davidsen@sungod.crd.ge.com (ody) (08/17/89)
In article <12035@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com> cjc@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Chris Calabrese[mav]) writes: | A 25Mhz '386 AT&T box running X windows is slower than | a Sun 3/60 running NeWS, yet the '386 has more raw cpu power. I | believe this is due to the above mentioned differences in the way the | graphics boards work. I don't know who's X you were looking at, but I don't think that's a general characteristic. I have seen the INteractive X and it is so much faster than a 3/60 (or Sun 4, for that matter) that it looks like a canned demo. Since I was telling the demo person what to type I'm sure it was really doing the commands. I agree that there are some versions of X which are (a) old and (b) slow. Hear me, SCO?? bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM) {uunet | philabs}!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
davidsen@sungod.crd.ge.com (ody) (08/17/89)
In article <1324@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US> gaggy@jolnet.UUCP (Gregory Gulik) writes: | Ok, speaking of comparing 386's to a Sun 2/160. Just today I was | comparing the load handling abilities of both. Guess what. I found | that the Sun (who's dhrystone rating is 1/5th of the 386's) was able | to handle a load almost as well as that "hot" 386... How did you compare? I don't say you're wrong, but we have a 386 with 4 serial users, 4 on optical connectors, and ? many more on ethernet. It gives reasonable performance, which doesn't happen on a 2/160 with load average higher than about 2. I'm sure you can find some 386 with low enough i/o bandwidth and/or small enough memory to choke under load, but comparably equiped I don't see that the 2/160 will get the job done. My first Sun was a 2/160 and I have a 386 now, so I know which one handles my load better ;-) bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM) {uunet | philabs}!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris) (08/17/89)
>In "workstations", either the graphics board can do many of these >things itself (i.e. the Sun color framebuffers or the Silicon Graphics >machines), or the workstation is only used for the display and keyboard >functions (i.e. X server only workstations or the AT&T 630) and >another machine is used for compute bound processing. The machine on my desk, a Sun-3/50, is not being used only for the display and keyboard functions - I do compiles on it all the time - and its frame buffer is a boring old array of bits. The 3/50 is generally considered a workstation, not a PC.... I don't even know that on all *color* workstations there's special hardware to move the 8-or-more-times-bigger pixels around. I think there exist graphics accelerators for PCs as well, so the presence or absence of a graphics accelerator is *not* what makes the difference between a PC and a workstation.
wlm@archet.UUCP (William L. Moran Jr.) (08/17/89)
A software developer friend claims that when you can walk into almost any mall and find a half dozen stores selling software for it, then it is a personal computer. Bill -- arpa: moran-william@cs.yale.edu or wlm@ibm.com uucp: uunet!bywater!acheron!archet!wlm or decvax!yale!moran-william ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ``There is Jackson standing like a stone wall. Let us determine to die, and we will conquer. Follow me.'' - General Barnard E. Bee (CSA)
rbj@dsys.ncsl.nist.gov (Root Boy Jim) (08/29/89)
? From: ody <davidsen@sungod.crd.ge.com>
? I agree that there are some versions of X which are (a) old and (b)
? slow. Hear me, SCO??
It's a pretty good bet that when someone sez "Hear me <company>" or
"<person>, are you listening?" that they're not.
? bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM)
? {uunet | philabs}!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen
? "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
Root Boy Jim
Have GNU, Will Travel.bet@orion.mc.duke.edu (Bennett Todd) (09/12/89)
Warning: inflammatory opinions follow! In article <1168@mitisft.Convergent.COM>, kemnitz@mitisft (Gregory Kemnitz) writes: >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. >[...] >There is almost no general-purpose (non-techie) software for workstations, >and what little there is costs thousands. and so on. I think he hit the nail on the head, so to speak. For the most part, workstations I've seen run PD or otherwise freely available applications (obviously there are exceptions, but in terms of user-hours running applications, or megabytes of disk allocated, I think the free stuff dominates). By contrast, I would think that proprietary commercial software tends to dominate the PC market. Applications for PCs seem geared to being accessible to someone without forcing them to read extensive documentation; workstation software is often well-neigh unusable without reading the manual, or getting a wizard to show you around. Basically, I think what it comes down to isn't hardware characteristics at all (the Mac II has just about all the hardware that would be needed to make it a workstation, but you would never confuse it with one) but rather the intended audience. PCs are targeted at folks who won't read documentation, and who will be running commercial software. For doing routine word processing and light-duty data processing stuff they are a very cost-effective solution. Workstations are targeted at development; either doing software development for its own sake (CASE, anyone?) or doing other tasks which are sufficiently specialized that you don't have a huge market to go shop for commercial software, and so are going to be having to write it yourself to get the job done. So, they need to be user-friendly, where the first users are the programmers. PC vendors aren't excited about UNIX; it provides access to a whole lot of flexibility, and it is terse. These make it complicated for a neophyte to fire up the word processor, and maintain their repository of documents. Those word processing packages for workstations that succeed in concealing this sophistication from the user do so at the expense of having to rewrite a bunch of MacOS. Workstation vendors are more-or-less committed to UNIX (if they want to sell any boxes in todays market!) because it provides access to a whole lot of flexibility, and it is terse. These make it extremely pleasant for experienced programmers to get their work done. These days the predominant PCs seem to be the IBM family and clones, which are running an evolutionary descendant of CP/M on an evolutionary descendant of the 8080; the Mac, running an office-automation application (instead of an operating system) basically developed by Xerox; and the ST and Amiga, newer machines whose OSs contain influence from both directions (in the user interface presented). You can certainly develop software on any of these; however, folks doing big stuff seem to prefer workstations, even though they cost more. These days the predominant workstations all run UNIX. You can pay the money for a workstation, pay a goodly whack more for some spiffy software from Frame Technology, and enable it to perform a job that a Mac II could handle for substantially less money. You can also go the other direction, and buy a 386-based PC and jazz it up with aftermarket UNIX, ethernet interface, mongo disks, and so on and make a dandy workstation out of it. I think the NeXT is an interesting case of a machine with a personality conflict. It seems to be attempting to appeal to both markets, with questionable success. It would need to be cheaper to compete as an appliance; the overhead it pays in the attempt seems to make it less attractive as a workstation. There! Is there anyone out there I haven't insulted? No? O.K., I'll stop now.:-) -Bennett bet@orion.mc.duke.edu P.S. I *said* "Warning: inflammatory opinions follow!". Kindly email me the flames; we don't need to clutter comp.unix.wizards with them.