Date: Thu, 13 Jun 1996 09:02:58 -0400 (EDT) From: Rashid Karimov <rashid@rk.ios.com> To: branson@widomaker.com (Branson Matheson) Cc: blewis@vet.purdue.edu, njensen@salsa.habaneros.com, questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: I'm almost afraid to ask, but.... Message-ID: <199606131302.JAA02399@rk.ios.com> In-Reply-To: <199606131223.IAA29675@garion.hq.ferg.com> from "Branson Matheson" at Jun 13, 96 08:23:06 am
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> Benjamin Lewis uttered with conviction: > >Niel C. Jensen wrote: > >> It's time for us to upgrade and buy a new Internet server; primarily > >> running Aache and probably mSQL. Our present server is based on FreeBSD > >> 2.1R, and I've been very happy with it (thank-you FreeBSD team!). > >> Unfortunately, I'm getting questions from my colleagues re. the use of > >> other systems (i.e. Sun Netra, Sun SPARC5, SGI WebForce Indy, etc). The > >> feeling is that because we are not paying (through the nose, I might add), > >> we are not getting quality, fast systems. I would like to get some hard > >> evidence to support my arguments to continue using FreeBSD. > > There was a report on performance differences between Solaris, FreeBSD and > Linux running on a pentium from the Usenix96 conference: > > http://www.usenix.org/publications/library/proceedings/sd96/lai.html > In any case, don't go with new brands 'cause them clients heard of SGI or Netra's, whatever. Go with what works for you. Or get some Sun pizza box - empty :), put it in the rack and show it to the potential customers and/or your salespersons just to make them happy. I saw Sun Netra a couple of days before (we have other Suns in place - IPC,5,10,20,Ultras). Most of ppl here know it is just generic Sun 5 with Sol 2.4. The thing I saw was slow as hell, carrying standard Netra SW package ( it was idle BTW). Openwin took 2 minutes to start ! The thing performs somehwere at 486-33 level. SGI Indy crashed3 or 4 times on me last time I saw it - some memory faults. It would even reboot in the middle of reboot. And those things are expensive ! On the other end we have examples of FreeBSD machines doing everything - from 100Mb routers talking to MAEs and millions-hits-a-day Web servers to 10.000 accounts user servers on regular Pentiums. Assuming you have decent HW , those one perform very reliably. Adn - you have full sources, you have an open comunity of developers ready for discussion. Security issues are also important. My position here is that in case with commercial systems it takes weeks/months for the vendors to deliver patches and while they are working on it,average John Doe wouldn't even know about problem! - unless he has some very close friend there,who for some weird reason didn't sign non-disclosure. Rashid.
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