bob@allosaur.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) (11/24/88)
This machine is a 3/50, and for the past month or so has been blessed with a Helios 8Mb expansion, for a blissful total of 12Mb. After the initial installation (we were a Beta site) and cleanup of a cold solder joint or two, it has run like a champ. I don't know what Sun's maintenance policy will be for them, nor do I know what Helios' maintenance will be like, but I haven't needed either yet for this expansion board. A memory expansion makes a diskless 3/50 a usable workstation under X11 and other large window systems. With the normal 4Mb, it swaps to death and is quite painful to use. Now, I can run a 5-way parallel make of the X protocol library, and have my normal X server, Emacs, several xterms, several other toys and tools, and still not swap. When I move the mouse across the screen, title stripes highlight immediately, rather than pausing for a leisurely moment while the client and window manager are eventually swapped back in. If the economics are right for you, I'd recommend a memory expansion. I'll miss it if it ever goes away. It's *really* nice and results in a useful workstation again for modern ever-more-bloated software. (Of course, the standard disclaimers apply: I have no connection with Helios or any other 3rd-party memory supplier for any machines, other than as a happy Beta-tester.)