> From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Wed Dec 2 01:18:41 1998
>
> > I just bought a few more dual PII-350 systems with Tyan 1832DL motherboards.
> > Total cost for board + 2 processors was $705. That's not a whole lot more
>
> reasonable prices. but the point is that super7 boards with K6-2/300's
> will run less than half that. depending on what you're doing, you'll
They're also less than half as fast. Sometimes you really *do* get what
you pay for. 8-)
> be better off with several uniprocessors. it'll be interesting to see
I find that hard to believe. Consider that in addition to another board
and processor, you need another case, floppy, network card, video card,
hard disk, RAM, etc. IF you're doing processor-intensive tasks, spreading
the load over multiple machines is a nightmare, even with Beowulf and
gigabit ether.
> where AMD prices their upcoming K6-3; considering that the current L2-less
> K6-2's provide good competition for PII's, the K6-3 should be hot.
It provides reasonable competition, but no SMP ability (this IS the SMP
list) and a rather bleak upgrade path.
> > harder. I'd be tickled if AMD could come up with a more cost effective
> > solution, but $700 just isn't a lot of money. By the time AMD has
>
> rest assured that $700 _IS_ a lot of money. it's 35G of 15 MB/s UDMA
> disk space, for instance. close to 500 MB of PC100 sdram. two very
> good 17" monitors, etc. there are labs that can blow that kind of
> money on a comfortable solution, but most have to cut closer to the bone...
Perhaps in your space $700 is a lot of money. For the average business
person or even the average consumer, it's not. Personally, I'd rather
just spend the $700 and have something that's fast and upgradable with
minimal headache...rather than buy 2 $500 machines and try to cobble
them together as a "virtual machine."
Again, I've been a big supporter of AMD in the past, but this is
the SMP list and they don't have any competitive offering for SMP
systems. If the K7 happens and you can actually purchase a motherboard
that supports them in SMP configurations, I'll be happy to re-evaluate
my position.
Regards,
Chris
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