[SPARCbook] re: linux on GX

[James Meacham]

Just wanted to add my two cents in on this discussion.  I have to agree that
the 3GX is not the most peppy machine in the world, particularly running
solaris.  And it's true that the level of quality of the hardware, and
particularly the hardware integration, is much higher than it would be in
similarly priced intel machines.  For me, the deciding factor was the
unix-centricity of the sparcbook.  I could get a P133 and run Linux on it,
sure, and it might even be as fast,  but intel machines are not designed with
my mind in mind.  I'm a unix geek for 10 years now, and I appreciate that this
is a machine that is designed for a particular OS, and that OS happens to be
one I can be productive in without a lot of arm-twisting.  For years, because I
used originally Macs, then NeXTs, then Suns, I have been totally, blissfully
ignorant of the configuration of my hardware.  They just work.  So I decided to
go with the sparcbook because I knew I wouldn't have to spend a lot of time
making the system work (and again, where can you get decent P133 laptop with
SCSI/ISDN/Sound/800X600vid/Externalvid/PCMCIA/Ethernet?)

Peace,

James

On 04-Nov-99 Adam Rogoyski wrote:
> On Wed, 3 Nov 1999, Len Rose wrote:
>> Excuse me, but I use fast sparc machines all the time, and the 3GX is
>> dog slow. I still use it a great deal but I'm a realist. I'm not going to
>> debate
>> anything else you've said with the above exception because I don't want this
>> to
>> turn into some holy war. I honestly wanted to know what others felt about
>> not
>> using Solaris on such a slow machine when there are so much faster laptops
>> around. Maybe I'm a minority but I didn't buy the Tadpoles because they were
> 
>    Why is buying a laptop to run Solaris any different from buying a
> laptop to run OpenBSD or NetBSD or Linux or whatever?  You are right,
> there are much faster laptops around, and you can run Solaris on those
> intel laptops as well, just like BSD and Linux.  You can argue this over
> scsi/ide, intel/sun, sun5/ibm keyboard, whatever.  Different things suit
> different people at different times.  
>    
>    Adam
> 
> 
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James David Meacham, 3rd
System Administrator/Internet Systems Specialist
JHU Center for Communication Programs 
410.659.6367 (office)   410.619.6760 (pager)