FreeBSD I LOVE YOU

[Andrew Sinclair]

Moved here because it wasn't a question. - Andrew Sinclair.

Anthony Atkielski wrote:

>Xian writes:
>
>X> I installed FreeBSD on a machine with an Athlon 3200 that I accident under
>X> clocked to 1.4GHz. I didn't notice for quite a while as the performance was
>X> amazing any way. It didn't half go some when I put the clock speed up to
>X> 2.2GHz.
>
>I think people nowadays forget how fast computers are.  Remember, UNIX
>was designed long ago, at a time when a computer that could hit one
>million integer instructions per second was nearly science fiction.
>UNIX was therefore designed to be fast, and even today, despite the
>gradual evolution that the OS has undergone, it still is extremely fast
>compared to certain very bloated operating systems that were written at
>a later time, when increasing hardware speeds could conceal laziness on
>the part of systems programmers.
>
>Given what older hardware used to support under UNIX, I wouldn't be at
>all surprised if you could support 1000 simultaneous timesharing users
>on FreeBSD with a modern PC.  If you add X then you naturally gobble up
>resources and bring UNIX closer to Windows or the Mac, but if you run a
>straight text-only OS, it can be hard to ever come close to the machine
>capacity with any kind of real-world load (meaning a realistic load of
>the type for which UNIX was intended).
>  
>
I once worked at a company that was holding on to this "Prime" computer 
system for the bulk of their operations. The thing had a clock speed of 
about 33MHz and served 42 users on VT-1xx emulated terminals.
For some time, I contemplated setting up a desktop system with FreeBSD 
to prove that they were loosing money on this black hole. A few months 
into the job, someone beat me to it with twelve high priced DEC 
AlphaServers running OpenVMS, and they were just used to manage the 
shops (one to be the server, eleven to be used with VT510s as cash 
registers). For reasons beyond me, they didn't ditch the big tank until 
after they were brought out and had moved to a new location.
So yeah, by the standards of those days (1997) I could get two doesen 
iPaq's to do all that. What buzzwords would I have used; redundant, UPS 
protected, portable client and server model computing appliances? 
Unfortunately, PDA's were out of my league then so my only option of 
desktop PCs would not have made much of a statement they would care to 
notice.

>I never seen less than about 97% idle my machine, and the average over
>time is closer to 99.9% idle.  The machine is definitely working, but
>with a streamlined OS and straightforward applications that don't have
>to drive GUIs or play music or animate movies, it flies.
>
>  
>
High Def is half the fun of it.

Wishlist:
- SO-HO router with Mobile Pentium ULV and CompactFlash removable 
firmware card.
- 2D matrix of DELL Axim 50v's functioning as a grid computer and a 
videowall.