[SunRescue] MP3s

[James Lockwood]

On Tue, 23 Nov 1999, Martin Frost wrote:

> I was basing my comparison on the fact that I found some Java software
> that I wrote a couple of years ago ran at roughly the same speed (within
> 10-20%) on an SS5/110 and my 486/100. I never did any proper sort of
> benchmarking, though, so this could have been down to other factors (or
> it could have been a slower SS5 without me realising).

Unfortunately, Java code is probably not the best for benchmarking
anything besides JVM performance.  There are too many possible
interpretations of the standards to make a reliable test of CPU power
possible.

A SS5/110 should be anywhere from 1.5 to 4 times as fast as a 486/100,
depending on what you do.  Cache-busting code will perform better on the
SS5, cache-friendly code will perform relatively well on the 486.  Code
that involves bit rotates (RC5) will perform better on the 486 than the
SS5 as SPARC generally doesn't implement bit rotates in hardware (one
reason why RC5 "benchmarks" are misleading to judge general CPU power).

> This was my backup solution, but I was worried about the bandwidth if
> I want three or four going at once on 10Mb ethernet. I'd considered
> various compression schemes, and would probably use Huffman-encoded
> deltas (possibly splitting the 16-bit deltas into high and low parts
> and Huffman-encoding them separately).

This could work.  You might also just try some canned compression systems,
gzip may decompress fast enough if the input stream uses mild compression.

> Does that mean that LX audio has a higher CPU hit?

Both should be basically identical.

> My main non-ideological reason for preferring Suns to PCs in this case
> is that they are easier to netboot. On the PCs I'd probably end up
> booting from floppy rather than network!
> 
> My main reason for preferring the LX to anything else (including the
> SS5, which would otherwise be ideal) is its size. PCs in particular
> are not a friendly size for hiding away on a shelf. ;)

Very true.  You might also check out a DEC Multia if size is very
important, they are small, have decent CPU power, and have onboard audio.

-James