hare@cs.purdue.EDU (Steve Hare) (03/02/91)
>Each SS400 = 22 MIPS => 0.44 MIPS/user >Say the Sequent had 30 486 processors rated at 14 MIPS each >i.e. 30*14 = 420 MIPS => 0.84 MIPS/user >>So it look's like the dozen Suns would give you *more* power per user >>than a single Sequent. >So it looks like the more power theory is out. Besides that, MIPS is not >the only thing users need. Are you going to duplicate the disks >on 12 suns or have a file server and use NFS through the network? >administer 12 suns vs 1 machine? Waste memory, swap, CPU >and other resources for 12 OSs vs one. >Also there are things other than users which use the machines. >Most sequents are used for applications, datebases and services server. It >would be hard to split a large service like news across 12 Suns, >or spread your database across 12 suns and so on. >Basicaly what it comes down to is that you can't compare Suns and Sequents, >they are designed and made for different purposes. I simply couldn't resist this thread of interest. Both of you have very valid points, but seem to neglect the most important consideration all of us base our decisions on - $$$$$$$. Let's say I buy 12 Sparcserver 470's with single SCSI disk at our academic price of $36K each. Let's make them 2 gigabytes systems by putting another 1.3 gigs of disk on at $4K, or maybe a single disk and more memory. A nice round figure of $40K / machine. 12 of them is $480K. Now even with my great discount at Sequent (a secret of course), it is unlikely that I will be able to get a 20 processor S2000 (roughly the same aggregate MIPS as 12 SS470's) with 12 gigs of disk space and plenty of memory for $480K. We have many Sequent machines here and like them very much. Recent price / performance ratios have made distributed environments much more acceptable again. The point that we are comparing apples and oranges is well taken. Limited $$$ however, always assists in the decisions we need to make. *Sun and Sequent sales execs take note - the above is an example. Save your phone calls :-) >>Needless to say these are my views not Sun's... >Needless to say these are my views not OSU's... Needless to say these are my views not Purdue's... Steve Hare Research Facilities Manager Purdue University Computer Sciences Department hare@cs.purdue.edu (ARPA) ...!purdue!hare (UUCP) 317-494-7820