You can do a windows cluster thing, but it's still not as good even as Condor for Unix. All in all, I'd say to tell them to go screw themselves unless they want to give you money for a LOT more hardware as well as software, to make up for the fact that you're not going to be able to do as much with it. If MS wants to be taken seriously as a hardcore number-crunching OS, the bastards can EARN it instead of trying to bribe academics.
I've been looking at this a lot myself now, as I'm also building a cluster for use in a computational bio lab at Florida State. It certainly seems that Linux is the only way to go right now. In case anyone cares, my cluster right now is 16 nodes of:
Tyan S2460 with 2 Athlon MP1800+ processors per node 1 gig PC2100 RAM per node 20 gig 7200 RPM Maxtor HD 3Com Gigabit over copper Ethernet low-end cheapass video and floppy, etc. All in these really nice rack cases, with a big black 2001 monolith-esque rolling rack to shove it all around in. It cost just about $26,000 to build so far, but the plans are to expand it to as many as 512 nodes within the next year or so. Whee!
I don't get where you show that it's impossible. The Roman empire stole most of its technology and culture by the conquest of smarter but weaker nations, and they lasted for quite a while.
I hate @home, because I've had their competition to compare them to. They are my third broadband ISP, and are by far the worst both in terms of speed and quality of customer service and tech support.
>Even if @home tanks, (which, I have no reason to think it will not) AT&T, and whomever buys it (which is pretty much a foregone conclusion at this point, just a matter of who, for what price) has great reason to keep the current subscribers very happy in the near and long-term future.
Well, that would be a switch. They've done nothing but piss me off up til this point.
Their Usenet service sucks
Upstream bandwidth cap
Even downstream isn't what it should be
Pig-ignorant tech support
Frankly, the ONLY reason I am on the @home network is that my local cable ISP gives me no choice, and there is no DSL. If I had any choice whatosever, you can bet your ass I would be elsewhere. I can see how for those who only use their net connection for surfing the web it would look fine, but for those of us who use it for more demanding things @home is completely inadequate. My only hope is that once they go under a better ISP (or hopefully several) will be available to me here in BFE.
I saw it too. I wouldn't say "It's a Ghostbusters knock-off because it was directed by Ivan Reitman", I'd say "It's a Ghostbusters ripoff because it's exactly friggin' like Ghostbusters" is more appropriate. It was fun, but it was also almost identical both in plot and style to Ghostbusters.
Slashdot Mirror
Whoa! I think we may have finally figured out their business model! Make up for the lack of revenue by filing creative lawsuits.
You can do a windows cluster thing, but it's still not as good even as Condor for Unix. All in all, I'd say to tell them to go screw themselves unless they want to give you money for a LOT more hardware as well as software, to make up for the fact that you're not going to be able to do as much with it. If MS wants to be taken seriously as a hardcore number-crunching OS, the bastards can EARN it instead of trying to bribe academics.
I've been looking at this a lot myself now, as I'm also building a cluster for use in a computational bio lab at Florida State. It certainly seems that Linux is the only way to go right now. In case anyone cares, my cluster right now is 16 nodes of:
Tyan S2460 with 2 Athlon MP1800+ processors per node
1 gig PC2100 RAM per node
20 gig 7200 RPM Maxtor HD
3Com Gigabit over copper Ethernet
low-end cheapass video and floppy, etc.
All in these really nice rack cases, with a big black 2001 monolith-esque rolling rack to shove it all around in. It cost just about $26,000 to build so far, but the plans are to expand it to as many as 512 nodes within the next year or so. Whee!
I don't get where you show that it's impossible. The Roman empire stole most of its technology and culture by the conquest of smarter but weaker nations, and they lasted for quite a while.
Yes, but now it's about as hip as a candy-colored iMac.
Couldn't agree more.
Any excuse is a good one.
I dub thee...Pretzelus!
To coin a term, my mileage has varied.
I hate @home, because I've had their competition to compare them to. They are my third broadband ISP, and are by far the worst both in terms of speed and quality of customer service and tech support.
>Even if @home tanks, (which, I have no reason to think it will not) AT&T, and whomever buys it (which is pretty much a foregone conclusion at this point, just a matter of who, for what price) has great reason to keep the current subscribers very happy in the near and long-term future.
Well, that would be a switch. They've done nothing but piss me off up til this point.
Well, let's see...
Their Usenet service sucks
Upstream bandwidth cap
Even downstream isn't what it should be
Pig-ignorant tech support
Frankly, the ONLY reason I am on the @home network is that my local cable ISP gives me no choice, and there is no DSL. If I had any choice whatosever, you can bet your ass I would be elsewhere. I can see how for those who only use their net connection for surfing the web it would look fine, but for those of us who use it for more demanding things @home is completely inadequate. My only hope is that once they go under a better ISP (or hopefully several) will be available to me here in BFE.
I saw it too. I wouldn't say "It's a Ghostbusters knock-off because it was directed by Ivan Reitman", I'd say "It's a Ghostbusters ripoff because it's exactly friggin' like Ghostbusters" is more appropriate. It was fun, but it was also almost identical both in plot and style to Ghostbusters.
Still misspelled marshmallow tho.