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IBM takes aim at Sun
Sensei@bonsaipotato.com points us over to the latest move by IBM. IBM is rolling out their RS/6000 S80 and is aiming to beat Sun at all sides in the Unix universe, both with this roll-out, and their pending purchase of Sequent.
Rather than learn to live with people who are different from us, and learn to tolerae their failings, it's better to just turn on the computer, so that the only people you interact with are the ones that are just like you.
I don't see any problems with that. There are many more people than I could ever hope to interact with. I have to make choices as to which people I choose to interact with. You think that my choice should be guided by some random or semi-random (tenants in an apt building) process -- why? I feel neither need nor obligation to learn to live with a women two doors down who thinks that Jerry Springer show is the greatest thing since sliced bread.
People naturally congregate in groups according to their interests and worldview (Slashdot is an example). I don't see that as bad, or, as a matter of fact, avoidable.
We talk alot here about the evils of censorship, but have you ever stopped to think about the evils of the usenet kill file?
There was a big discussion on that subject some time ago on Slashdot. You might want to consider two observations:
(1) Your right to talk does not imply my obligation to listen
(2) Killfile is a personal choice made by me as to whom I am willing to listen to. Censorship is an external choice made by someone else as to what I should be able to hear.
Do you read all Usenet every day?
Kaa
Kaa
Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots.
Read the fucking Linux Kernel Mailing List FAQ before shooting your mouth off. And if you're going to dispute it, benchmark it in a reasonable context and prove your claim.
Remember that what's inside of you doesn't matter because nobody can see it.
Actually, the next generation Starfire will have a COMA architecture. (might have ccNUMA too though... not sure yet). See Project Serengheti, though products won't be out for at least another year.
Lock contention with 4 processors is down to 2% (saw the number somewhere, done with SGI benchmarking for the kernel), and is expected
to go down further.
Never seen an AIX vs. SunOS 4.1.3 religious war before. Go, go, go!
:)
OK, time for Buzz Word City
For the type of applications Sun and IBM are targetting, raw processor speed becomes a marginal parameter in the design space. Instead, the smart cookies focus on the I/O-memory subsystems which becomes the performance bottleneck and cooling system which determines the overall reliability.
The StartFire is based on cross-bar switch technology spun off from Cray when it was purchased by SGI. As such it is analogous to a shared bus where processors (ie passengers) find it relatively easy to communicate between each other inside but the maximum capacity is somewhat fixed in that it costs the same whether a few passengers or fully populated. However, it has the advantage of being easy to migrate.
The original IBM SP series from which their current distributed memory design is derived can be compared with a truck convoy using CB radio (switched memory backplane). More flexibility in adding capacity means better efficiencies in matching load to task and thus better pricing (though at these lofty levels, the profit margins are MUCH heftier than PCs so there is a lot of gap for undercutting the competition).
The SGI ccNUMA (cache-coherent non-uniform memory access) can be compared with an articulated truck with multi-channel CDMA wireless giving a hypercube topology for fast node-node communications. Specifically designed for scalability and balanced I/O throughput, it commands a premium for its complexity and sophistication.
On a sliding spectrum of shared-distributed, the order would be Sun-SGI-IBM, but as processors speeds increase, both Sun and IBM are adopting ccNUMA techniques. Now a diversified transport system would require a judicious blend of each computer, matching the capabilities to each machine's strengths. Any claims of superiority are marketing delusions as you would not use a bus where a truck is needed. That is what supposedly CIOs get paid 6 figure incomes for deciding and service arms like IBM get fat consulting fees (any reader comments on their effectiveness?).
Note that raw technical considerations can be distorted to some extent by legacy concerns and availability of drivers (sys-admins). Personally I see the high-end server space get more competitive and cut-throat as souped up cars attempt to claim a slice of the action. However, some companies will need to hit with a clue-bat as the planned technological obsolescence of consumer items do not sit well with business (there are good reasons why you'd stick with old-style mainframes based on the principle if it ain't broke, don't meddle with it as more fixes are likely to add more bugs).
LL
An argument that has been rolling around in my circle recently has been the future of computers and the extent that they will affect our lives. I, being the optimist that i am, am hoping that they will continue to become more and more part of our everyday lives. Infiltrating our appliances, homes, and everything in between.
Now, i also am of the mindset that it would be beneficial in the end effect to have large supercomputers running each and every apartment building, and in each home having dummy terminals. Now, is this a viable alternative to the PC, or is noone willing to take the chance that some privacy will be comprimised.
I like the idea. I'm sure that there are others out there that have the same view. Thoughts? Comments?
(This is not really THAT off-topic, IBM.. SUN, they build mainframes that would most likely be used as the servers for the dummy terminals. see?)
rJames.org - illustration
The UNIX software operating system is used to run computers that control a variety of key business operations, like telephone networks, stock exchanges and office data centers. It is the main alternative to Microsoft's Windows NT.
Right! And my Ferrari is the main alternative to a Nissan Micra! When you reach the 16 or more processors, M$ Windows NT is not an alternative. I doubt it is ever one, in fact.
M$Windows users have RSI, Unix users have AWK
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
...in Germany: Today, there was a 10-page 4-color A3-size flyer in "DIE WELT", one of Germany's biggest newspapers, advertising the RS 6000. That must have been insanely expensive.
Anybody know if the 24 CPU box was going to support Linux?
IBM would have to throw some kernel hackers at the RS/6000 kernel in order to get it to tick. But nowadays that wouldn't be unheard of.
I'll believe it when it shows up on the top of this list, for example. It's cheap to claim you have the fastest computer -- much more impressive to prove it in an open forum.
Does anyone know what they are basing their claims on?
Geeky modern art T-shirts
Now let's get nice and dirty. Solaris is up to what, 2.7? After being SunOS 4.1.13. (Not sure on version number here, feel free to correct.) And still has bugs. Just recently IBM released OS/390 Version 2, Release 8. A followup to Version 2, Release 7
First off, Solaris 8 is approaching (or in) early access (it rocks, btw). Second off, surely you're not claiming that just because AIX (ugh... it hurts just to type those letters) has a higher version number that it's better?
"This one goes all the way to 11, it's one louder".
I really don't know what you've been smoking, but the concept that AIX has been "whipping Sun's ass" is ludicrous. Sun has the number one position in Unix server market share, is the platform of choice for scalability, and is FAR more palatable to just about every sysadmin I know than that evil bastardization AIX.
You're also forgetting that E-Business is where it's at right now. Sun is dominating the E business scene and the Netscape/AOL/Sun alliance just makes it that much more deadly. Why do you think Sun's a target? Because they're at the top, you yoyo.
IBM may have "invented" the mainframe, but they got their clocks cleaned by people willing to move faster, work harder, and play smarter. They lost the burgeoning PC market to Microsoft, and the high-end server market to Sun and HP.
Personally, I'd be much more afraid of HP than of IBM, if I were in charge of Sun.
And you think that's good?
:-(
Rather than learn to live with people who are different from us, and learn to tolerae their failings, it's better to just turn on the computer, so that the only people you interact with are the ones that are just like you.
What a fun society _that_ will lead to
This is the problem with the internet. It results in groups of people who can only talk to those that agree with them. Note the way any kind of discussion bewteen people who disagree on an important matter disintegrates into flames.
We talk alot here about the evils of censorship, but have you ever stopped to think about the evils of the usenet kill file?
'Hmmm - this guy said something I disagree with, and he said it in a kind of annoying way, and I've got a sore head this morning, so I'll press this one little button and make sure I never listen to anything he has to say again.'
Sure, you can un-kill them - but if you never hear from them, chances are you won't know if they've anything good to say.
Nasty stuff...
-----
I don't know how IBM are comparing their performance to Sun's Starfire. Pretty meaningless without giving any details. btw the Starfire is over 2 years old now. I don't think Sun are yet officially supporting their 450Mhz UltraSparc-II in volume on Starfire yet, even though it's been out for a while. (btw, you can get US-II 450's with 8MByte of 2nd level cache - clocked at 450Mhz!) Also, Sun's UltraSparc-III will be shipping in volume this December, starting at 600Mhz, and from early SPEC 95 benchmarks I've heard of it's about 10% faster (in fp) than an 600Mhz EV67 (Alpha 21264A) and they haven't even finished optimising it yet. SPEC int should be very good too.
Latest SPEC results here - 600Mhz Athlon has SPEC int/fp of 27.2/21.6. 667Mhz EV67 (Alpha 21264A) has SPEC int/fp of 37.5/65.5. The more competition, the better! (that includes competition between OS's) .
From your resident RS/6000 guru...
Reality check time once again! Woohoo!
Sun's already getting their asses beat by IBM in the unix arena so badly, it's almost sad to watch Sun's faltering and pathetic attempts to so much as *touch* IBM.
For those of you who remain clueless, let me issue you the official reality check of RS/6000 supporters the world over.
The RS/6000 SP2 in it's many retail versions, including basic 16 node configurations, dots the 'Top 500 Supercomputers' list all over, probably comprising somewhere around 20% of it. Not a single retail Sun is found on that list. The SP2, even with nodes, is cheaper than a Sun 'HPC' setup that would come anywhere near it's performance.
Now let's get nice and dirty. Solaris is up to what, 2.7? After being SunOS 4.1.13. (Not sure on version number here, feel free to correct.) And still has bugs. Just recently IBM released OS/390 Version 2, Release 8. A followup to Version 2, Release 7. The S/390 is reguarded as one of the most powerful parallel computing systems available today, and OS/390 is without a doubt the most robust, reliable, and flexible unix-like operating system on the market.
Now we can get into what Sun wants to do, websites and such. Sorry, IBM's got it plenty under control with the RS/6000 C20, F40, F50, H50, R50, H70, and S70. They'll gleefully outserve any Sun you put them up against. And they run Apache, too. Then there's the ultimate in complete connectivity, the AS/400 series, which can handle more networking than Sun, comes with Domino, which while being commercial, follows standards and handles your webserving, email, LDAP, ad infinitum. And will smoke Netscape Suite-Spot. Domino gleefully handles slashdot effect! Whereas www.sun.com is almost as slow as www.cisco.com. I've never had a problem with www.austin.ibm.com, www.direct.ibm.com, or any of IBM's websites.
Face it; IBM's *BEEN* better since day ONE. IBM *invented* the mainframe and the midrange. They have YEARS of experience on Sun. And they know how to use it. So, take this reality check, cash it, trade in your Suns, and get some RS/6000's to do the job better.
-RISCy Business | Rabid unix guy, networking guru
your company here.
shelby != ford