Ancient machines turning on (was Re: eBay strikes again...)

From: Allison J Parent <allisonp_at_world.std.com>
Date: Sat Oct 31 19:32:54 1998

< the modern uSoft OSs - win95/98 and NT4. I still get GPFs but nowhere n
< the frequency I got them with the dos-based windows. No microsoft OS ha

Last reboot of this dos6.22/win3.1 system was three weeks ago when I shut
it down to shuffle the drives and replace a dead fan. It's quite stable.
Then again I tend to trash apps that don't behave! I've also tamed a
few unruly ones with carefull edits or the creation of a proper PIF
file. Considering the number of DOS apps I run under windows Setting
things up right is a necessity.

To me GPFs are applications that under VMS would likely cause an
exception exit dump. GPFs are a poor error handling mech for programs
trying to do what should or are illegal things. It's easy to blame a
weak OS for crappy applications. Dos has few to no protections and
ragging on it is unfair.

< compared to the stability (weeks and months without rebooting) of Linux,
< in turn doesn't approach the bulletproof reliability you expect from VMS

The Slakware 3.0 Linux I have on a 386dx/33 that is a good machine but
with only 8meg of ram Linux is not that stable. Forget getting xwindows
to behave well in 8meg.

< I freely admit I learned most of my computer science under Vax-VMS so I
< strong bias towards it, but I've also run moderately large scale vaxclus

I'm biased as well, I run 7 vaxen here, two of which are LAVC members.
I also run RT-11, RSTS-11 and a lot of CP/M systems.

< and at least the versions we used... 5.5a, if memory serves, were remark
< reliable. To the point where we once had a cluster server loose its dis

Solid! I run both 5.4-4 and 5.5 and uptimes are limited by power on
times, though in the past I've seen months to years.

< I'm not a programmer. I'm a sysadmin/netadmin type. Ease of programmin
< secondary to me compared to reliability. A system that crashes frequent
< the bane of my profession's existance, because it means instead of spend
< time on the entire environment and routine maintenance you spend more ti
< firefighting mode.

That is why VMS, unix and their kin are used on the enterprize scale.
Dos/win was used that way but it was never conceived as a multiuser OS
nor as a networking server platform. Using it that way maybe a hackers
dream but a sysadmin nightmare.

< We were discussing why people don't get attached to PCs as much, and any
< machine that bombs frequently or in general causes headaches seems to me
< it's not going to be high on people's lists.

A machine that is poorly understood and marketed by processor speed
hype that shows zippy games. I still don't understand why a kid needs
a 300MHz PII to run simcity other than hype. To me it's simpler, one
486dx or PII is the same as another, ther eis nothing to distinguish
them. Even the PS2 series was at least different on the bus level.

It's a matter of maturity of the system and all of the software.

Allison
Received on Sat Oct 31 1998 - 19:32:54 GMT