From: booloo@framsparc.ocf.llnl.gov (Mark Boolootian)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sysv386
Subject: Summary:  Should I buy BSDI or Dell Unix for my 486?
Date: 14 Dec 92 21:03:52 GMT
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

A couple of weeks ago I indicated I was waffling between buying Dell's
Unix and BSDI's Unix.  I got many responses and have been planning to
summarize.  Unfortunately, I can't find enough time to do a reasonable
job, so I'm simply including the text of the most informative messages
below (I'm eliding the author's names as I hadn't indicated I was planning
on posting their email).

BTW, I've decided on buying Unix from BSDI.  I have found they are quick to
answer my questions (via email), I like the idea of source (alot!), I like
the idea of BSD (as opposed to SYSV), I like the idea of net support (lots
of hacks out there porting/debugging codes), and I like the fact that BSDI
is in business to sell systems, not hardware.

Without further ado:

	================================================================

I'm a happy BSDi/386 user. I've been using it since June running with
the beta release stuff.

Its a good BSD system if you like that sort of thing. In chosing Dell vs
BSDi you are also making a SRV4 vs BSD choice - this and source
availability are probably the most important issues here.

Having the source is great! It allows to change as you require and still
reload the orgional code if you screw up.

BSDi are now shipping the Gamma tape ( this is in the UK - the US is
ahead some ).

So what do you get in BSDi?

Pretty well everything

BSD / POSIX compliance
editors & test processing
networking  & nfs
kerberos
lots more

In all I'm realy happy about getting BSDi - it's fun...


	================================================================

I'm a very happy BSDI user.  The system is extremely stable and the
bells and whistles are starting to appear now.  THe support level I've
received has been excellent (better than SCO's).  And what cna I say,
having the source is a HUGE win.



	================================================================

In article <142525@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> you write:
>I am waffling between purchasing Unix from Dell or from BSDI.  Having complete
>source is extremely appealing, but I have to admit that I feel a little more
>secure about Dell being around for awhile (perhaps an erroneous impression,
>but I'm stuck with it).  I have read the pc-unix/software buyer's guide.  I

I can give you a few impressions, at least regarding Vr4 and BSDI (I
run UHC Vr4 on one machine here.  I considered buying Dell, but when I
couldn't get any info/any person to talk to me, I went with UHC
instead).  I am currently running UHC Vr4.0.3.6 on balkan, a 486/33
ISA machine which acts as my gateway.  I'm running BSDI (gamma 0.9.3)
on succubus, which is a 486/50 EISA.

>haven't bought my system yet, so I'm not constrained by hardware.  I plan on
>buying a 486 EISA system and running SCSI disk.

Both my systems are SCSI.  UHC doesn't have an EISA SCSI driver
(though my 1740 did work in ``standard'' (1540 emulation) mode under
UHC).  The information I have says that Dell doesn't have an EISA SCSI
driver either, their 1740 installation manual says to run in standard
mode for their Vr4.  I have heard that the Dell SCSI drivers are much
faster than standard USL drivers.  BSDI has enhanced mode support for
SCSI (adaptec 1740/1742 only, not Bustek) in the gamma version.

The uucp supplied with BSDI is a little flakey yet, it's the uunet
version.  There is one bug I've found, and reported, and then found a
patch for on the cdrom (it's a workaround, not a real fix).  I'm sure
this will be taken care of in the production version, and it doesn't
stop uucp from working (you just have to supply a full pathname for
the ``from'' file[s]).

Dell (and any other Vr4 for that matter) has more device drivers
available/supplied.  BSDI supports one smart serial card (which I've
never heard of).  It does have FIFO support for 16550A UARTs.  BSDI
supports one midi sequencer, and the cdrom has a SoundBlaster driver,
though it's unsupported.

Vr4 requires at least 150MB of disk for a minimal installation, BSDI
could probably get by on 50MB.  The BSDI kernel is _much_ smaller than
the Vr4 kernel.  However, Vr4 executables tend to be smaller due to
shared libraries.

I trust the networking, and especially NFS, much more with BSDI.

Frankly, I'm considering buying a binary license of BSDI to put on
balkan.  The only thing that's really stopping me is lack of support
for my DigiFax card, and I suspect that will be supported before too
long.  I believe someone is working (with the help of DigiBoard) on
getting the PC/Xe serial boards supported under BSDI.

	================================================================


I have talked to people who have used both BSDI and ESIX SVR4 (the ESIX
user was a SV sort of guy, so he wasn't worried by any lack of BSDisms, and
the SV admin stuff).  From their comments I think you would be better off
with BSDI.  BSDI has more nitpicky bugs, both seem to have the same number
of big bugs, but the BSDI "support" (really the programers, they take turns)
staff has helped far more.  The ESIX guy had a 6 hour talk w/ support about
why his kernel can't re-build (the final answer was "upgrade to a newer
version" (he just upgraded 3 months ago)).  The BSDI guy has gotten fixes
or useful clues in under 2 hours tops.

	================================================================


We just bought DEll am I am very impressed. We run it
on Gateway 486/33s. The installation was the easiest UNIX
install I've ever done. There are LOTS of tools, X windows,
programs, public domain stuff included. The system
is very complete, with the BSD commands and lib calls as well.
X windows came up first time with out any fuss. Slip works
great, the lastest G++ (GCC 2.3.1), compiled with
no changes at all.

	If you need kernal source the go with BSDI,
else I highly recommend Dell 2.2


	================================================================

>I'd appreciate hearing any pros or cons regarding Dell and BSDI Unix from
>folks out there, particularly those of you running one or the other.  I
>haven't been able to make up my mind based on my reading of the software
>buyer's guide, and am hopeful I can get sufficient input to sway me one
>direction or the other.
It depends on what you want to do with it. I have for years been using
several SYSV flavors on my PC (first on my AT, then my 386), and have
been constantly disappointed by
 - SYSV's uglyness (a matter of taste of course)
 - The frustration at discovering bugs that won't get fixed
 - Unresponsive resellers
 - SYSV's limitations (once again a matter of taste).
I ordered BSDI's beta the day it was announced. BSDI provides patches in
a timely matter (you can look them up for yourself by ftp@bsdi.com), both
when I reported problems, or when I looked for patches in a problem area
myself. Even for problems they don't solve yet, the availability of sources
is great.

Porting to BSD architectures has always been easier, than porting to
SYSV's (unless it's been done before for your specific version of SYSV).
This is the downside of BSD/386, there are fewer packages that compile
out of the box, because of the current market share of SYSV vs BSDI.
On the whole, there are fewer packages that I had to give up on for
BSDI, than packages I threw out in a rage after attempting a SYSV port.
Packages that are hard to port to BSDI are either extremely complex
(like gcc, but 2.3.2 was easy to port) or buggy to start with (top, which
contains several unchecked string copies in finite size buffers).

BSD/386 is stable (even in my beta system), more stable than SYSV has ever
been on any of my machines. BSD/386 is more friendly to the techie kind
of user (heck, SYSV provides for full screen installation menus that
actually provide *no* information above an installation manual).

No connections with either producer, other than as a very satisfied BSDI
customer.

	================================================================

I have been running BSD/386 since February, first as a beta tester and
now on their gamma CD release.  I have been very happy with the system,
and have had excellent support from BSDI.

Here are a number of reason's that I would recommend BSDI.  I don't
have any real reasons for not buying Dell, execept for a general
SysV prejudice.  Anyway, here it goes ...

1) BSDI's development & support staff : I have received excellent email
   support.  Within an hour or two of posting, I've always received
   answers from a support person or the developer of the code in question.
   It still amazes me, to receive mail from Mike Karels concerning
   kernel questions.

   Even better than the support, is the way they treat their customers.
   On more than one occasion, Rob Kolstad has sent mail to everyone
   asking them how they thought the company should proceed.  When 
   faced with having to change their "complete source" policy in order
   to get hold of some Xservers as well as motif, Rob ask the entire
   beta mailing list how they felt.  The overwhelming consensus was that
   if BSDI could only supply the code in object form or would have to pass
   on a huge source licence fee, that object alone would be better than
   nothing.  However, if available source was always to be shiped.  I
   was amazed, just to have a company ask me how I felt!

2) BSD/386 comes with Source and lots of other stuff : BSD/386 comes
   complete with networking, NFS, X11R5, gcc, gnu flex & bison, perl
   and lots of other software.  Last I heard, lots of the SysV vendors
   were charging for things piece meal.  

   However, having complete source for the OS is one of the big wins.
   I never get tired of checking out code and learning about the kernel.
   Problem solving is 100 times easier, when you can look at source.
   Besides, there is nothing like making a change to something, re-building
   the kernel, and then watching it work!

3) Stability :  BSD/386 has been incredably stable.  I've had my 486/33 
   EISA system up on the net since February.  The system has only crashed
   once.  The problem was isolated to haveing my SCSI controller clocked
   to fast for the system bus.  Since I changed the card's setting, I've
   had no problems.
   
   I use the BSD/386 system for mail, news and software develoment.  I
   prefer this system to using Sparcs that I have available.

4) It's BSD not SysV : I'm a BSD bigot.  I disapporve of what AT&T did
   to unix when SysV was created.  They added a lot of poorly thought out
   and poorly implemented code to the kernel.  They grabed some stuff
   from BSD 4.3 to make up for deficancies in their own code.  SysV is
   far from the dream of combining AT&T Unix and Berkeley Unix.

   BSD/386 is derived from the most recent BSD NET2 distribution.  It
   is very close to BSD 4.4, which will soon be available.  I fully
   expect BSDI to ship a version of 4.4, when they receive access to
   the code from Berkeley.

5) BSD/386 comes on CD : I think CD's are a great way to distribute 
   software.  You can mount the CD as a file system.  By creating 
   a directory/link tree to the source on the CD, it is possible to
   compile and make the system.  This makes it possible to have access
   to seldom used sources, while not having to was disk space for them.


	================================================================


Although I haven't used BSDI I have used Dell SVR4 and 386BSD so
I feel I have something to base my opinion on.

Dell is not a bad product, but if you want to be able to compile BSD
programs it sux.  SVR4 supposedly has all sorts of BSD features
available but my experience with trying to compile and run BSD 
programs has been painful at best.

386BSD seems mostly solid to me.  The price is right (free) and the
support from the net is much better than Dell's phone support.  
With a few exceptions it will compile and run BSD programs with
no problem.  It makes no claims to be able to run SVR4 code.
I don't think you will ever find commercial software released
for 386BSD (or BSDI for that matter) so you would have to be
content with share/free-ware.

	================================================================
-- 
Mark Boolootian		booloo@llnl.gov		+1 510 423 1948
Disclaimer:  My fingers type for me alone.