From owner-freebsd-advocacy Wed Oct 6 12:38:13 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Received: from charlie.cns.iit.edu (charlie.cns.iit.edu [216.47.143.70]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5791215767 for ; Wed, 6 Oct 1999 12:37:39 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from maneben@charlie.cns.iit.edu) Received: from localhost (maneben@localhost) by charlie.cns.iit.edu (980427.SGI.8.8.8/970903.SGI.AUTOCF) via SMTP id OAA36782; Wed, 6 Oct 1999 14:38:20 -0500 (CDT) Date: Wed, 6 Oct 1999 14:38:20 -0500 (CDT) From: "Benjamin M. Manes" To: Adam Szilveszter Cc: Greg Skafte , freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Subject: Re: An article from Microsoft In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > -Win NT has a lower TCO than Linux. Then the text says the same for UNIX > and then there is a link to demonstrate that which points to comparison of > WinNT on Intel and Solaris on SPARC... no comment. I'd like to see the > much-hyped Win2000 to be ported to that platform first...(or, in fact to > any platform apart from x86 and Alpha:-) Windows NT 4.x runs on Alpha, x86, and PowerPC. Of course, only x86 is currently supported. Windows 2000 (NT kernel) runs on IA-64, though who knows how much, but no one knows how much Linux runs on it too. The only real comparison of NT and UNIX was the famous NT vs. Unix article (forget URL), the rest have been opinions or real-world examples. > > -They quote better SMP and clustering support but somehow forget to > mention that to get > SMP beyond two processors, you need to purchase the irrationally-expensive > Enterprise Edition and for clusters the even-more expensive Cluster > Server...BTW ever wondered what difference there is between WinNT WS and > SRV? > Nothing, but the more advanced features are simply disabled in cheaper > versions... but they are certainly right in saying > that you need couple of PIII XEONs to run NT fast enough in demanding > situations:-) NT Workstation supports 1 - 2 proccessors (if you convert after install, you need the resource kit or to reinstall the OS), server supports 1-4 processors, and Enterprise supports 1-8 processors. I've used all of these, just not enterprise for long. :) Workstation vs. Server is only a minor regestry and application changes. However, you are not paying for the extras, more for the clients, MS support, and to stay legal when auditted. This is not an oddity, as just in the hardware world Intel does the same from the Celeron to the PII, to the Xeon. Or even better yet, the laptop versions are merely 128kb L1 cache changes. I don't see why people are more annoyed at Microsoft for doing a common practice in the business world, and not as much as others, such as Intel. It could be argued Intel has more of a lock than MS does. NT workstation/server to enterprise is mostly kernel changes. One example is to give applications 3gb and the kernel 1gb of ram, rather than giving each 2gb. I have the document of changes incase your really interested. > -They say that support for Linux is expensive but then they say that it > does not exist to a great degree which means that it cannot be > expensive...and of course forget to tell about > their "inexpensive" support options...but they are certainly right in > saying that it takes time to train real SAs who understand what's going on > instead of people who just > point-and-click-and-damn-it_wont_work-so-try_again-or-i_dunno:-) TOC is estimated as the cost of hardware, software, maintance, and cost of downtime. UNIX SA cost more than Windows ones, the hardware/OS costs range from who you use (Sun, SGI, IBM), downtime MS calls ~$0 with the 100% iniative. UNIX is traditionally more expensive in the short run. Software for UNIX is always more expensive in CADs, etc. Versions of programs, such as IDL, the now dead MathCAD, Maple, MatLab, etc are more costly. However, the UNIX varients usually include support such as xterm and other more poewrful distributed network abilities. > -the best item is:"Linux makes no sense on the desktop" (sic!) > No comment... i use FBSD as my desktop machine for more than half a year > now exclusively and never wanted to go back to win ever since...and the > machine cannot even demonstrate its server abilities because the univ > sysadmin will not allow this for students... :-( For a desktop, the amount of usable apps are important, and so is ease of use, along with it actually working. UNIX has some great tools that compete, some that are not on Windows, but in general, Windows has more. UNIX only in the last few years has had real office suites, and Lotus/Corel/MS suites on Windows are in many ways superior. Desktop is considered personal client machine, not acting as a server. > Journalling FS issue... others are more Linux-specific like the lack of a > centralised repository (i'd recommend www.freebsd.org...it will not be > easy to find something comparable for Linux) and as for the security The JFS is footnoted too. regards, Ben To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message