|
|
|
|
| Author |
Message |
Positronic Cat
Guest
|
 Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2004 8:49 pm Post subject: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
 |
|
Back in college, I cut my unix-teeth on an IPX. In a bit of
nostalgia, I now have one of my own. 2gb HD/64mb ram. Running Debian
Sparc Linux.
What would be a good 24 bit graphics card to use in this machine. The
CG6 is pretty nice, but I'd prefer a few more colors. Which will work
well with Linux under Xwindows 4.x?
Also, I'd love to boost the machine up to 128 mb ram, are the
expansion boards still available for a reasonable cost? What are the
part numbers?
I'm pretty new to Sun machines, but familliar with PC's and MACs.
Thanks in advance,
Mark |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
|
|
Rich Teer
Guest
|
| Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2004 8:50 pm Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004, Positronic Cat wrote:
| Quote: | Back in college, I cut my unix-teeth on an IPX. In a bit of
nostalgia, I now have one of my own. 2gb HD/64mb ram. Running Debian
Sparc Linux.
|
Not sure about your choice of OS... Sun hardware is happiest
running Solaris.
| Quote: | What would be a good 24 bit graphics card to use in this machine. The
|
In an IPX? I'm not even sure of one was available, at least
not from Sun. I think you might be SOL...
| Quote: | Also, I'd love to boost the machine up to 128 mb ram, are the
expansion boards still available for a reasonable cost? What are the
part numbers?
|
Those expansion boards are pretty rare, and hence, quite
expensive. Nostalgia aside (I have a few older machines
here myself), your best bet for a reasonable Sun experience
is something like an Ultra 1 or Ultra 30. Either of those
machines supports fast (for their time) 24 bit frame buffers,
and at least 1GB of RAM.
Good luck,
--
Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA
President,
Rite Online Inc.
Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
URL: http://www.rite-online.net |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Paul S. Brown
Guest
|
| Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2004 9:47 am Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
Rich Teer wrote:
| Quote: | On Mon, 19 Jan 2004, Positronic Cat wrote:
Back in college, I cut my unix-teeth on an IPX. In a bit of
nostalgia, I now have one of my own. 2gb HD/64mb ram. Running Debian
Sparc Linux.
Not sure about your choice of OS... Sun hardware is happiest
running Solaris.
|
However no currently available version of Solaris supports the IPX nor
indeed anything earlier than the SS10.
| Quote: |
What would be a good 24 bit graphics card to use in this machine. The
In an IPX? I'm not even sure of one was available, at least
not from Sun. I think you might be SOL...
|
I *think* the GT array was supported on the IPX. It'll be piss slow if it
does work and I don't think Linux/XFree support it at all.
P. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Rich Teer
Guest
|
| Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2004 5:48 pm Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
On Tue, 20 Jan 2004, Paul S. Brown wrote:
| Quote: | However no currently available version of Solaris supports the IPX nor
indeed anything earlier than the SS10.
|
True, unless you count Ebay auctions as being "available",
which I do. :-)
Granted, nothing later than Solaris 7 supports the IPX, but
Sun can't be expected to support old hardware forever.
--
Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA
President,
Rite Online Inc.
Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
URL: http://www.rite-online.net |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
neoholistic
Guest
|
| Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2004 6:48 pm Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
Positronic Cat wrote:
| Quote: | Back in college, I cut my unix-teeth on an IPX. In a bit of
nostalgia, I now have one of my own. 2gb HD/64mb ram. Running Debian
Sparc Linux.
|
Debian is my Linux distro of choice :)
However I must warn you, the C libraries (and especially the math lib)
in both Linux and OpenBSD are much, MUCH slower than those in Solaris.
I have run benchmarks in my SS20 - for floating point intensive tasks, Solaris can be *twice* as fast - also up to 50% faster for integers.
The difference is totally obvious when running The GIMP or other CPU
intensive software - they'll be slower on Linux or BSD.
Of course BSD and Linux are much 'lighter' so a machine as slow as an
IPX will probably feel a lot more 'responsive' running one of these.
YMMV.
| Quote: |
What would be a good 24 bit graphics card to use in this machine. The
CG6 is pretty nice, but I'd prefer a few more colors. Which will work
well with Linux under Xwindows 4.x?
|
Good for what use?
I think the IPX has two sbus slots. So you have:
Sun CG8 & Leo, Fujitsu AG10-E, Integrix F10E, Southland Media MGX &
MGX+, Parallax XVideo & PowerVideo, RasterFlex 32 & HR...
.... and probably a host of others.
The Parallax cards were intended for video editing (they have video
inputs), and the Leo, AG10-E and F10E are 3D accelerators. The Leo is
/very/ slow for 2D, and not that fast for 3D either - the other two
cards are quite fast (for their time), and support OpenGL natively.
The CG8 is a non-accelerated card, and thus rather slow - the MGX and
the RasterFlex 32 are accelerated 2D cards, and were fast in their
time.
There's another 24-bit sbus framebuffer by Sun, the GS, but it needs
three slots (and it's fairly old).
XFree86 supports the Leo card (too slowly to be usable). The others,
I've no idea, but they do work in Solaris.
Make your choice :)
| Quote: | Also, I'd love to boost the machine up to 128 mb ram, are the
expansion boards still available for a reasonable cost? What are the
part numbers?
I'm pretty new to Sun machines, but familliar with PC's and MACs.
|
The Sun Shack is your friend: http://www.sunshack.org/
| Quote: | Thanks in advance,
Mark
|
Good luck.
--
Please keep the 'x-no-archive: yes' header.
To reach me by email: transform my account name like IBM -> HAL. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
Thomas
Guest
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 22, 2004 8:47 am Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
neoholistic <ekqbwpo@neoholistic.org> wrote:
[...]
| Quote: | However I must warn you, the C libraries (and especially the math lib)
in both Linux and OpenBSD are much, MUCH slower than those in Solaris.
I have run benchmarks in my SS20 - for floating point intensive tasks,
Solaris can be *twice* as fast - also up to 50% faster for integers.
The difference is totally obvious when running The GIMP or other CPU
intensive software - they'll be slower on Linux or BSD.
[...] |
Just out of interest: Was that with the libraries compiled for sparcv7 or
for sparcv8? Many of the Linux or OpenBSD stuff comes as v7 as per default,
to be able to run on both architectures. Recompiling as v8 can make a lot
of a difference (though I think the OpenBSD folks came up with a solution of
their own in the more recent releases - haven't tested them on sun4m in a
while).
Cheerio,
Thomas
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thomas Ribbrock http://www.ribbrock.org
"You have to live on the edge of reality - to make your dreams come true!" |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
neoholistic
Guest
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 22, 2004 2:47 pm Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
x-no-archive: yes
Thomas wrote:
| Quote: | neoholistic <ekqbwpo@neoholistic.org> wrote:
[...]
However I must warn you, the C libraries (and especially the math lib)
in both Linux and OpenBSD are much, MUCH slower than those in Solaris.
I have run benchmarks in my SS20 - for floating point intensive tasks,
Solaris can be *twice* as fast - also up to 50% faster for integers.
The difference is totally obvious when running The GIMP or other CPU
intensive software - they'll be slower on Linux or BSD.
[...]
Just out of interest: Was that with the libraries compiled for sparcv7 or
for sparcv8? Many of the Linux or OpenBSD stuff comes as v7 as per default,
to be able to run on both architectures. Recompiling as v8 can make a lot
of a difference (though I think the OpenBSD folks came up with a solution of
their own in the more recent releases - haven't tested them on sun4m in a
while).
Cheerio,
Thomas
|
Interesting! I used the default libs, so I assume they were v7. I did
compile the executables as v8, though, but in the end it's libm and libc what made the difference.
Thanks for pointing it out; I'll give it a try next time I install BSD/Linux on my Sun.
--
Please keep the 'x-no-archive: yes' header.
To reach me by email: transform my account name like IBM -> HAL. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
Dennis Grevenstein
Guest
|
| Posted: Thu Jan 22, 2004 9:05 pm Post subject: Re: Sparcstation IPX - 24bit graphics? Memory board? |
|
|
Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> wrote:
| Quote: | Back in college, I cut my unix-teeth on an IPX. In a bit of
nostalgia, I now have one of my own. 2gb HD/64mb ram. Running Debian
Sparc Linux.
Not sure about your choice of OS... Sun hardware is happiest
running Solaris.
|
I think Linux still has these problems with sun4c machines.
However, in general Linux is not that bad on SPARCs. On more
modern UltraSPARCs you would probably prefer Solaris,
but Linux' hardware support for older machines is pretty good.
You should really try that occassionally and see yourself
what Linux can do on, say, a SPARCstation 5, 10 or 20.
Believe me. I'm not saying that I would easily get this:
bash-2.05$ uptime
6:24pm up 154 day(s), 20:30, 1 user, load average: 0.02, 0.01, 0.02
with SPARC Linux (it's just my small Solaris/SPARC server
at home), but Linux can be very nice on Suns.
Talking to the original poster, I would propose some
version of SunOS 4 (the IPX was first supported in 4.1.1)
just to be more nostalgic :-)
mfg
Dennis
--
I'm trying to port NetBSD to my cup of tea, but it keeps kernel panicking
on refill. This is odd, because I ported it to my toaster and my bookcase
easily enough and it survives bread- and book-replacement fine.
Jared "Danger" Earle (NetBSD tech-ports mailing list) |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
  |
Index
-> SUN |
All times are GMT
|
| Page 1 of 1 |
|
| |
Watched Topics
Search
Register
Log in to check your private messages
Profile
Log in
Memberlist
Usergroups