wjw@eba.eb.ele.tue.nl (Willem Jan Withagen) (12/14/90)
We've been complaining a lot about HP <=> Apollo lately. Not that I think
that we're overdoing it, but here's a story which I heard from a friend.
My friend's lab has bought 4 SUN-386i systems about 8 months ago. We all know
that SUN in pushing SPARC like HP is pushing 9000/400's. But since their
stations are relatively new, they are not really into upgrading.
One of the projects he is working on requires the use of C++. And this is
something which is/was made by SUN, and they still do that for some of their
other systems. Serious inquirements at the SUN address made clear that the
386i-line is considered obsolete, and no further development was done in
this area. This would even hold for things like new OS's and the likes.
So his brand new machine were already outdated before they were shipped.
His complaints at the address of SUN resulted in an update offer which was
very good(joke :{):
Get SPARCS and return the 386i's.
The discount for a returned 386i would be around 500$. :-)
(The machines are only ~8 months old, and the machine is only on the market
for about 2 years)
If we set this off against HP's attitude then HP doesn't look so bad after all.
At least we don't get shafted this bad if we have old products. And they try
to push new products, they make it sound reasonable.
**** NOTE ****
I didn't say that I'm happy with everything that is going on, but
hearing the 'SUN' story makes we feel less bad.
Willem Jan Withagen.
Eindhoven University of Technology DomainName: wjw@eb.ele.tue.nl
Digital Systems Group, Room EH 10.10 BITNET: ELEBWJ@HEITUE5.BITNET
P.O. 513 Tel: +31-40-473401
5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlandsnazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) (12/14/90)
In article <995@eba.eb.ele.tue.nl> wjw@eba.eb.ele.tue.nl (Willem Jan Withagen) writes: >His complaints at the address of SUN resulted in an update offer which was >very good(joke :{): > Get SPARCS and return the 386i's. > The discount for a returned 386i would be around 500$. :-) >(The machines are only ~8 months old, and the machine is only on the market >for about 2 years) > >If we set this off against HP's attitude then HP doesn't look so bad after all. >At least we don't get shafted this bad if we have old products. And they try >to push new products, they make it sound reasonable. Sun's upgrade and compatibility support has always been horrendous. Apollo always tried to be quite good about compatibility (from the inside I thought we were, I'm not sure how it looked on the outside; upgrades weren't an option, but your software continued to run for a long time, and old machines were supported for a long time). I think the that one of the reason the current situation pisses people off so much is that HP has tossed those policies out the window - they remind us far too much of Sun. Maybe the only way to succeed in this business is to screw your customers, but frankly I'd rather fail. But we'll see. I have a feeling things may change. -kee -- Alphalpha Software, Inc. | motif-request@alphalpha.com nazgul@alphalpha.com |----------------------------------- 617/646-7703 (voice/fax) | Proline BBS: 617/641-3722 I'm not sure which upsets me more; that people are so unwilling to accept responsibility for their own actions, or that they are so eager to regulate everyone else's.
holtz@cascade.carleton.ca (Neal Holtz) (12/20/90)
In article <1990Dec14.034938.8533@alphalpha.com> nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) writes: >Apollo always tried to be quite good about compatibility (from the >inside I thought we were, I'm not sure how it looked on the outside; >upgrades weren't an option, but your software continued to run for >a long time, and old machines were supported for a long time). This user thinks you did a great job. Our first Apollos came very early in 1984 (DN300's and DSP80's with SMD's). A few of these are still running (SR9.7 still). My first Apollo program was a simple graphics program. I still use it daily on my DN2500. It was last compiled in 1984, having gone from SR7 (I believe) to SR10.2 without recompiling or relinking. I think this is remarkable, is one of the reasons I have been (futilely (?)) pushing Apollos around here, and it saddens and dissapoints me to see it ending. -- Prof. Neal Holtz, Dept. of Civil Eng., Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada Internet: holtz@civeng.carleton.ca Tel: (613)788-5797 Fax: (613)788-3951
rees@pisa.ifs.umich.edu (Jim Rees) (12/23/90)
In article <1990Dec19.170128.5038@ccs.carleton.ca>, holtz@cascade.carleton.ca (Neal Holtz) writes:
This user thinks you did a great job. Our first Apollos came very early in 1984
(DN300's and DSP80's with SMD's). A few of these are still running (SR9.7 still).
My first Apollo program was a simple graphics program. I still use it daily on
my DN2500. It was last compiled in 1984, having gone from SR7 (I believe) to SR10.2
without recompiling or relinking.
I think support for sr8 Unix programs (AUX, before Domain/IX) has been
discontinued. I don't have any of these around so I'm not sure what happens
if you try to run them.
My oldest binary is a version of use_font timestamped Oct 11 1981. It still
runs on my sr10.3 dn4500.
I just tried running a program on our Vax that was last compiled in
September 1981, on bsd4.1. It didn't work:
% cv -hd f
sorry, pid 21217 was killed: exec: error reading data area
Killed
%
On a related note, what's the oldest running Apollo node? When I left it
was //eve, node id 8. The Computer Museum in Boston has node id 3, with
wire-wrap boards, but it wasn't running when I saw it.
Anyone remember /sau/demo?nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) (12/24/90)
In article <4ec0e23a.1bc5b@pisa.ifs.umich.edu> rees@citi.umich.edu (Jim Rees) writes: > >I think support for sr8 Unix programs (AUX, before Domain/IX) has been If you can figure out a way to patch the SYSTYPE they may still run, but it probably depends on what calls you made. -- Alphalpha Software, Inc. | motif-request@alphalpha.com nazgul@alphalpha.com |----------------------------------- 617/646-7703 (voice/fax) | Proline BBS: 617/641-3722 I'm not sure which upsets me more; that people are so unwilling to accept responsibility for their own actions, or that they are so eager to regulate everyone else's.