Jim, per your request, my interpretation of SGI-VW is the tail of:
The good: Fast graphics and good looks. Don't underestimate the image processing capabilities of this machine. It is performing almost twice as fact as HP-FX6 for almost 1/2 of the price (~6K with normal 21'monitor). The video processing capabilities along with its firewire capabilities are not any short of being excellent. Also you have to love the flat panel monitor (add $2k) and the sexy looks of this machine.. It really stands out..
The Bad: the machine is not as stable as I initially assessed it. It crashes often, specially on any software that SGI has developed for it. For instance it crashes on SGi demos and when it runs the only SGI made screen saver, it has (the same one which was demoed at Comdex last year). It crashes when running netscape, so you better use MS Explorer. Almost all of its software is not compatible with off the shelf software, and has to be loaded from the SGI site, and they are mainly not up to date (few generations back in some cases). Most of the hardware stuff, are not compatible with the market (ie., memory, SCSI, etc..) The PCI card is an old design and the list goes on..
The UGLY.. The marketing, The production, The support.. I don't think I need to go any further on these. Buy one and you will find out. |
