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Date:      Sat, 1 Feb 2003 17:12:22 -0800
From:      Kris Kennaway <kris@obsecurity.org>
To:        La Temperanza <temperanza@softhome.net>
Cc:        freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Learning about other architectures
Message-ID:  <20030202011222.GA41196@rot13.obsecurity.org>
In-Reply-To: <20030131235502.08f068c8.temperanza@softhome.net>
References:  <bulk.927.20030131203102@hub.freebsd.org> <20030131235502.08f068c8.temperanza@softhome.net>

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On Fri, Jan 31, 2003 at 11:55:02PM -0800, La Temperanza wrote:

> I'm pretty uninformed, so tell me about some of the alternatives to x86.
> Will I be able to match or improve performance/stability/etc as a home
> UNIX user?

non-x86 hardware tends to be more expensive (supply and demand), but
you can pick up good cheap second-hand equipment on ebay.  e.g. a sun
ultra 30 goes for about US$200, an ultra 60 for about $400 (watch a
few auctions to get a sense of the price fluctuations before buying).
If you want something as fast as the latest x86 CPUs expect to pay
MUCH more.

> How is sound and graphics support (since I listen to music,
> watch DVDs in mplayer and like to play the occasional 3D game)? Are
> there any other caveats I should know about?

FreeBSD/sparc64 does not yet have console support (e.g. no X), but for
any PCI-based machine you can just use ordinary PCI cards.  Non-x86
platforms have not been as widely tested, so you may run into caveats
(e.g. some network drivers do not yet work on sparc because they are
written non-portably).

Kris

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