From: x90wardell@gw.wmich.edu
Newsgroups: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: DEC bets the company on NT?  WRONG!
Date: 7 Jan 93 20:16:59 EST
Organization: Western Michigan University

In article <1993Jan7.222909.20160@grebyn.com>, mfraioli@grebyn.com (Marc Fraioli) writes:
> In article <1993Jan7.063028.14772@fcom.cc.utah.edu> brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill) writes:
>>that represents a leap ahead in usability, said Microsoft officials and
>>
>>Digital is literally betting their company on Windows NT, for if NT doesn't
>>fly, then neither does Alpha, and, as a Digital spokesman said: "Alpha
>>is not a part of Digital -- Digital is a part of Alpha." The company intends
>>to license any and all parts of their Alpha technology to all comers,
>>hoping to make it an industry standard. If they succeed, you can kiss
>>UNIX good-bye, except as a Macintosh-like niche player -- Windows NT is
>>that good.
>>
> This is all one of the biggest loads of crap I have ever seen.  Just
> today I attended Digital's Open Systems Open House in Alexandria, VA,
> where the Alpha processor was the star of the show.  Yes, NT was demoed
> at the show, and yes, there was significant interest.  However, it was
> only shown on one Alpha machine (it was running on several of DEC's 486
> machines), and the Alpha demo was running 28 copies of Solitaire, and no
> one was allowed to touch the machine (the keyboard and mouse were locked
> in a cabinet under the table).  Anyone want to guess why?  The Alpha
> machines running VMS and Unix were readily available for anyone to poke
> at as they wished.  Could it be that NT is embarassingly unstable?
> Further, Digital is in no way "betting the company on NT".  Of the seven
> models of Alpha-based machines they were showing, NT runs on only one of
> them, the low-end EISA bus machine.  All other Alpha models use DEC's
> TurboChannel bus, and NT DOES NOT RUN ON THEM.  I asked the DEC
> representatives there about this, and they were very clear on it.  They
> said that if initial reaction to NT on Alpha was positive, they would
> consider porting it to their actual workstations in addition to their
> PCs, but this is by no means certain.  I was also told that there were
> no plans at all to put NT on any of their multi-processing servers and
> data centers-- NT's vaunted multi-procsessing abilities will not be
> exploited on Alpha hardware any time in the near future.  In the Q&A
> sessions that I attended on the future of Alpha computing, most of the
> questions were about VMS, interestingly enough.  Admittedly they had a
> separate session specifically for NT, and it was well-attended, and this
> may have drawn off NT-specific questions from the other sessions.
> 
> So in sum, Digital will be offering NT initially only on their PCs,
> including Intel and Alpha based PCs, but not on their workstations or
> servers, which will be Unix or VMS only for at least the next year or
> two.   The Alpha PC costs ~$7,000, and according to DEC will provide
> about 5 times the performance running NT of a 486/50.  They claim about
> 2.5 times the performance of Pentium, although this is obviously hard to
> be sure about.  It is obviously only for very high-end PC users, and
> those are really pretty rare.  The whole NT/Alpha combo didn't look too
> impressive to me.


	Sometimes, I really wonder how much knowledge of the computer
industry Brian really has.  Beyond his little publications and
is Academia environment he often seems ignorant of what is really going
on.  Speaking as someone who has a rather intimate familiarity with
DEC (Digital) the thought of DEC betting everything on their PC running
NT is sickening.  It is simply untrue.  As was pointed out, only the
Alpha PC (keyword PC) will be running NT.  The other DEC Alpha based
computers will (again, as said before) running VMS.  VMS is an 
excellent operating system and there are VMS like OS's from DEC that
are REAL TIME OS's.  
	I am also aware that many people in DEC are very displeased with
Microsoft concerning NT.  Their Alpha based PC which could have been
a MAJOR player in the PC market is sitting there waiting for an OS that
Microsoft said would (originally) be out in early 1992 and now looks
like it won't be out until September.  You see, DEC's Alpha would have
blown the socks off other PC's and even could accept its add on cards
(EISA slots -- again mentioned above).  But now, NT won't be released
before the Pentium (P5, 586, whatever) and that performance advantage
will diminish significantly.
	Alpha is very important to DEC but believing that DEC is part
of Alpha is nonsense and the thought that NT will be running on
even most of the alpha based computers is simply wrong.  The basic
architecture of the PC is inadequate for many things including
performance levels found in minicomputers.  Turbo channel is a much
better alternative.

							-Brad

(sorry to ramble).




> 
> -- 
> Marc Fraioli
> mfraioli@grebyn.com	        	(So I'm a minimalist...)
Newsgroups: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy