[rescue] Suns vs PCs (WAS Re: Amiga videos online for your enjoyment)

[Scott Quinn]

> Spoken like a man who doesn't have to watch an RS/6000 system
> ( p570 ) POST. Or an HP-UX box for that matter. Makes the glacial Sun
> kit POST seem like racing in across the salt flats in a rocket-
> propelled, monkey-driven vehicle.
>

It's a UNIX workstation/server. It isn't supposed to be turned off 
unless you're doing something with the hardware (that said I do keep 
mine off- noise, heat & electricity use are a bit too much to keep them 
on).
RS/6k, HP9k, and Sun (with diag-config? on) are slow for a reason- they 
check and double-check just about everything they can so failing bits 
can be found before they die at a critical moment. Once they're running 
it's a different matter- look at the Power6 benchmarks. While the 
machine is running, look at the purpose - Suns (like VAXes) aren't 
designed to be SPEC-monsters, they do move data around very well, 
though.

Remember that people don't by x86-PCs because the design is technically 
excellent- they're bought because they're cheap yet passable.