rf@wu1.UUCP (10/27/84)
A brief study of the microprocessor market:
8086 Family. Itty-bitty business computers, at least until IBM
comes out with the IBM-pc/xa, which will allow arrays larger than
64K. Operating system: pc-dos extensively modified by IBM.
68,000 family. Graphics machines. From Macintosh (for home use)
to Sun Microsystems. Some scientific, medium scale communications
applications. No floating point standard (a major disadvantage for
scientific use); inadequate memory management. Operating systems:
Unix System V, Apple Mac.
National Semiconductor 32,000 family. The workhorse of future
medium-scale transaction-processing computers. Contender for
medium-scale scientific use. Contender for medium-scale (in
networks, large-scale) business use. Standard floating point and
paged virtual memory management. Operating systems: Genix (Berkely
4.2 Unix), various Unices with transaction processing support.
Open markets:
The 4 to 16 terminal business computer. Probable occupants: IBM,
DEC. A much expanded IBM-pc, a small VAX, a small 4300. Possibly
an NS 32,000-based system from some as-yet unknown company. The
IBM series 30 (system/34, system/36, system/38) is self-limiting
and will soon be too costly for this market. The series 30 is
massively incompatable with existing software. If IBM sells 4300s
to this market they may run VM -- certainly not DOS or OS.
Conceivably, some unknown could capture this market.
The automated office. Possible occupants: IBM, Apple, DEC. It's
not yet clear whether workstation networks or medium-scale
computers will fill this niche. At the moment, Apple has the best
workstation for this application, but will be releasing their
network early in 1985. IBM will also release a pc network in 1985.
1985 promises to be an interesting year. On the medium-scale
computer side, either VAXen or 4300s running VM are possibilities.
At the moment, DEC has the better system. Conceivably, some
unknown could capture this market.
The next home computer. Possible occupants: the Apple Macintosh
(68,000 processor), the Mindset (80186 with graphics co-processor.)
Probably the market will go to one of those two; possibly to both.
Randolph Fritz
UUCPnet: {ihnp4,decvax}!philabs!wu1!rf
If economists predicted weather, we'd never speak of seasons.dch@genie.UUCP (Dan Hannah) (01/30/85)
Soon you will be seeing a really good machine at a fraction of the cost! (referring to Macs) The Atari will run circles around the competition... Close B clothes mode... Deputy Dan