[rescue] Re: [geeks] THIS. MAKES. ME. SICK.

[Dave McGuire]

On June 13, Brian Hechinger wrote:
> > What.  They have to stay competitive, and the fact is that many (most?)
> > places the buy highend Crays also would like to be able to install an
> > array of cheaper setups for different working groups.
> 
> hey, SGI isn't doing too well these days.  at least they didn't just slap a
> Cray logo on a big Origin box.

  They're doing fine.  They keep selling HUGE machines (with HUGE
profit margins) to government labs.

> the Alpha is actually a pretty slick CPU.  not vector mind you, but how much
> call is there for big vector machines these days? (Dave or James?)

  As much call as there was in the 1970's.  Do we still run weather
predictions?  CFD?  Do we still do finite element analyses?  Of course
we do.  The types of operations that vectorized on the first vector
machines of the 1960s still vectorize today.  And if those operations
were BEST done on a vector processor back then, then they're STILL
best done on a vector processor.  By their very nature.  I can't think
of a better way to explain it; I hope that's adequate.


               -Dave McGuire