From: ben@rex.uokhsc.edu (Benjamin Z. Goldsteen) Subject: Re: X terminals: Suggestion for projects like SLS, MCC, etc. Date: Sat, 19 Jun 1993 09:08:15 GMT
hasty@netcom.com (Amancio Hasty Jr) writes:
>Well in digging around I found a complete PC system 486/33 for $1350 with
>a 14" color monitor.It has a 130MB disk and is capable of running both
>DOS and Unix.
>The system is capable of generating more than 80k xstones. I know because
>I hack on X servers :-)
>As for a previous note on X terminals storing fonts on their memory we
>do the same but store the fonts on the card itself :-)
>Please consider that Color Xterminals start around $1600 so if we replace the
>PC cpu with a 486/66 it will performance faster than the X terminal at lower
>a price.
>It takes me about 20 minutes to configure and load from scratch
>and the configuration scripts can be automated to the point in which
>it can take less than 5 minutes.You will basically, boot a floppy answer
>a few questions and walk away and after the process is completed just simply
>can accomplish the task faster.
Wow, that is pretty good. I still can not get NetBSD running on
my_cheapest_clone_in_the_world_pc (I bought it to run WordPerfect two
years ago). I havn't tried recently -- actually it would work if I did
not want to keep DOS.
>However, I am trying to come up with a much cheaper hardware configuration
>to match the B&W X terminal diskless configuration.
Hmm -- you do not have to convince me -- I was just trying to fix
up what I consider to be unfair comparisons... Since that $875 Xterminal
runs QNX, I have to assume it is based on an x86 compatible chip.
Therefore, I think we really have look at this as it really is -- a
philosophical difference. I have already stated what my philosophies
are...
-- Benjamin Z. Goldsteen