Hi Qwik,
In 4-5 years, Sun will be light years ahead of any 32-way non-smp box INTC can produce. Don't forget, the "commodity" advantage in price is a distinct disadvantage when it comes to RAS. RAS is the reason Sun & IBM equipment is more expensive. It has less to do with "proprietary manufacturing vs. commodity manufacturing" than is does with RAS.
Besides, going from 500mhz to 1 ghz is a 100% performance improvement, but going from 1.5ghz to 2ghz is only a 33% improvement. Therefore, INTC must make ever-larger leaps in cpu speed to make the chip worthwhile. It's not a horserace. It really isn't.
Besides, that doesn't address the truly pitiful (when compared to Sun & IBM) throughput of the PCI bus. The PC still isn't an I/O machine. It still is a desktop processor (albeit much faster than in 1981).
I agree with you that Linux is far superior to NT (or whatever they call it now). I can see DELL & Linux in the same box as an ok lower-end solution in enterprise computing. BUT, DELL has to be the one to support it. When they apply RAS to Linux, you'll see the price skyrocket.
You'll notice that this is what CPQ has been trying to do. They have tried to move from screwdriver-company to computer company & they fell flat on their rear-ends doing it. It's not simple to be a computer company. You can't just do it on the cheap & expect to survive.
There's no magic in this business, Qwik. Lot's of INTC fans would like to think so, but there isn't.
Unfortunately, I didn't get as much out of Mr. Cringley's piece as I would have liked. But, your point is well-taken. M$FT has to be stopped from any arm-twisting to get it's software spec (C#) installed in PC's while Java becomes "incompatible". It's clear that M$FT wants to own the PC through their software even though they don't really own it. But, remember, Sun can afford to give Java & their office suite away for free, M$FT can't. As long as M$FT is prevented from forcing Java to not work properly, it should be ok. I don't see why not at this point, regardless of Mr. Cringley's "analysis". This struggle is far from over.
BTW: it is my understanding that the states have a say-so in whether this "settlement" is actually adopted. I think the Bush administration & Justice Dept. freaked because of the economy & they wanted to clear this dispute asap up as a way of "jump starting" the economy. That's a poor reason for a settlement. |
