reb@quintro.UUCP (Roger E. Benz) (04/21/89)
> From: ami%suntops%pitstop%male%sun-arpa.uucp@ames.arc.nasa.gov (CSD) > Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc. > Subject: Re: Welcome to the New Wave > > I believe that Apollo had a little over 3,000 employees. > Sun has at LEAST three times that. We are also doing > so well that we don't need someone to come to our rescue. Dear Ami, I have been reading the flame war between you and the Apollo group for a few days now and want to add to the war. You keep stating that your response was to correct some errors in an earlier posting. However, your posting of the number of employees at Apollo was incorrect. You also claim that you were not flaming anyone or anything. But to me > We are also doing > so well that we don't need someone to come to our rescue. is a flame against Apollo. So before you start defending yourself GET YOUR OWN FACTS STRAIGHT! Also, even if you were correct (which you aren't) you deserve every flame you receive. How dare you come onto our news group and imply that SUN is better than Apollo. Only their marketing is better. Apollos hardware and software is MUUUCH better than SUN's. Your own comment proves that. You claimed that SUN had 3 times the staff as Apollo, yet their sales were not even twice as much. That must mean that all those extra people are needed to support a lower quality product. Right? Roger E. Benz Phone = (217) 223-3211 Quintron Corporation Quincy, Il UUCP: {elroy,lll-winken,laidbak}!spl1!quintro!reb
ami@suntops.UUCP (CSD) (04/22/89)
In article <330@quintro.UUCP> reb@quintro.UUCP (Roger E. Benz) writes: > > >You keep stating that your response was to correct some errors in an >earlier posting. However, your posting of the number of employees >at Apollo was incorrect. > I was told the number of employees at Apollo by an APOLLO EMPLOYEE, which I have stated previously but which you have cared to ignore. I am truly sorry that that employeed does not know the number of employees in her company. > >So before you start defending yourself GET YOUR OWN FACTS STRAIGHT! My facts are straight. Sun carries 30% of the workstation market. From what I am told, HP + Apollo still is much smaller. > How dare you come onto our news group and imply >that SUN is better than Apollo. Only their marketing is better. Sorry, this is everyone's news group. If you want to be prejudice about the postings, get yourself an Apollo moderator. You can believe what you want, but the truth is that Sun came up from nowhere a few years ago and stole the market away from both you and Dec, who were always the leaders. Now we hold the largest share of the market. We must be doing something right. Ami disclaimer...
wescott@LNIC1.HPRC.UH.EDU (Andrew M. Wescott) (04/22/89)
I just have one thing to say to you at this point... Get a CLUE! Andrew Wescott
freedman@cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Dan Freedman) (04/23/89)
Corporate loyalty from both the Sun side and the Hpollo sides of the fence has been invoked in this newsgroup recently. Lets face it, both Sun's and Apollo's workstations are really neat pieces of technology. Sun definately has the edge on marketing, and Apollo has the edge on technology. (Yes, Sun has recently announced some really nifty new workstations, but we all know that the computer business is a leapfrog game - each vendor leapfrogs over the other vendor's latest technology). BUT, REGARDLESS OF WHICH IS MORE ADVANCED OR WHICH SELLS BETTER, I don't think there will be too much disagreement with the statement that ALL workstations currently available are an extremely long way from being perfect machines. The o/s's are full of bugs. The software is slow, and the system's overhead is high. The compatibility between systems is pretty poor. Everybody's customer service is lousy (can anyone truly say that they are happy with the technical support that they get from their vendor? If so, did you get good technical support from the beginning, or did you have to really fight for it?). Lets hope that Hpollo really *can* give Sun a run for its money. If it can't, the losers will be us, the customers, because the incentive to improve the systems will be reduced. After all, why spend many dollars on development if the equipment is already selling well, and if there is no competition waiting to take over with better systems. Let's hope that with a few big players all competing for the workstation market, we will see better systems *and* better marketing and support from all vendors. Dan Freedman University of Calgary Computer Science Department 2500 University Drive N.W. freedman@cpsc.UCalgary.CA Calgary, Alberta, T2N 1N4 ...!alberta!calgary!freedman
samit@demon.siemens.com (Ben Samit) (04/24/89)
In article <187@santa_fe.UUCP> ami@santa_fe.UUCP (Ami Peterson -CSD) writes: >In article <330@quintro.UUCP> reb@quintro.UUCP (Roger E. Benz) writes: >> >>So before you start defending yourself GET YOUR OWN FACTS STRAIGHT! > > My facts are straight. Sun carries 30% of the > workstation market. From what I am told, HP + Apollo > still is much smaller. > From the bar chart on the front page of the EE Times of April 17, 1989: 1988 Market Share: Sun 28.3% DEC 18.6% HP 16.9% Apollo 13.5% HP + Apollo = 30.4% BS | "It's a jelly" - Bob McKenzie | | ARPA: samit@demon.siemens.com uucp: ..!princeton!demon!samit | | snail: Siemens SCR 755 College Rd East Princeton, NJ 08540-6668 | | These opinions are solely mine and in no way reflect those of my employer. |
kelley@apollo.COM (John S. Kelley) (04/26/89)
Kindred Folk. Thank you for your fine efforts to educate Ami. I admire her loyalty to her company and their products. She's the best representative Sun could offer. John Kelley | These are my thoughts. Apollo Computer, Inc. | Do not assume they 300 Billerica Road | represent Apollo's. Chelmsford, MA 0182 4 | 508 256 6600 x8695 | kelley@apollo.com |
collins@nvpna1.prl.philips.nl (Donal O'Coileain) (04/26/89)
In article <187@santa_fe.UUCP> ami@santa_fe.UUCP (Ami Peterson -CSD) writes: >>So before you start defending yourself GET YOUR OWN FACTS STRAIGHT! > My facts are straight. Sun carries 30% of the > workstation market. From what I am told, HP + Apollo > still is much smaller. This is NOT a flame, just a correction of the above. Sun holds 28.3% of the market, while the HP-Apollo combination has 30.4%. __ / / / Donal O Coileain. collins@nvpna1.prl.philips.nl or collins@apolloway.prl.philips.nl -- And out of the gloom a voice said, 'Smile and be happy for things could be a lot worse'. So I smiled and was happy and behold, things got worse --
tomg@hpcvlx.HP.COM (Thomas J. Gilg) (04/27/89)
>>> So before you start defending yourself GET YOUR OWN FACTS STRAIGHT! >> My facts are straight. Sun carries 30% of the > Sun holds 28.3% of the market, while the HP-Apollo combination has 30.4%. FYI, Breakdown of Workstation Players previous to Apollo + HP deal Sun 28.3% DEC 18.6% HP 16.9% Apollo 13.5% Others 22.7% A little old, but figures from Dataquest, May 1988, for the Western European Technical Workstations Market Shares. Sales: Units: 1) HP 27.1% 24.9% 2) Apollo 24.1% 24.1% 3) Sun 19.3% 23.1% 4) DEC 13.3% 13.1% 5) Other (rest) (rest) Thomas Gilg tomg%hp-pcd@hplabs.hp.com
slocum@hi-csc.UUCP (Brett Slocum) (05/02/89)
In article <1198@cs-spool.calgary.UUCP> freedman@ksi.cpsc.ucalgary.ca.UUCP (Dan Freedman) writes: > >[ . . .] Everybody's customer >service is lousy (can anyone truly say that they are happy with the >technical support that they get from their vendor? If so, did you get >good technical support from the beginning, or did you have to really >fight for it?). We have had Apollos since 1983, when all you could get was the DN400, and the 2-d graphics station which I can't remember the model number of (DN600?). Since that time, we have had excellent customer support from Apollo, up until we switched to internal Honeywell support due to mistaken ideas about cost. Apollo usually had someone out within a couple hours for hardware problems, and the hotline was usually very helpful (though the time was longer). We did have some problems with one of the technicians they sent out a few times, but that was cleared up when the new technician took over. All in all, we had many good things to say about Apollo support, and few bad. On the other hand, we have also had Suns since the beginning as well. And we had the exact opposite experience with their technical support (what technical support). They were very slow and unwilling to accept that there was a problem. On another note, one Apollo system administrator could manage twice as many workstations as our two Sun administrators. Everything was easier on the Apollo. Backups were simple - one machine could backup the entire ring. Software could be installed on any node in the ring from one node. Many other tasks were faster, easier, and more convenient. None of these comments have anything to do with the technical merits of either machine, or the cost (which we find Apollo to be cheaper when buying multiple machines). -- Brett Slocum UUCP: ...uunet!hi-csc!slocum Arpa: hi-csc!slocum@uunet.uu.net "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."