Re: [9fans] Cute plan9/inferno client?

[erik quanstrom <quanstro@quanstro.net>]

> Erik, your intel fanboism really bores me.

[citation needed]

by the way, i don't think there is any room for
personal attacks on this list.

> I love that some people here put a lot of work into other low power,
> small form factors. And instead of useless 3d graphic cards perhaps we
> will have some kind of FPGA cpu server some day :)
>
> I just don't want to get stuck with intel when there's so much other
> neat stuff floating around.
>
> Intel is dying now, more than ever.

[cititation needed].

there's always "neat stuff" floating around.  unfortunately there
is limited time, and many different things to consider.

i don't think it's unreasonable to not be interested in an overo
they're very slow, have little memory and have poor or no networking.
in addition, i think we still need a number of drivers to make them
useful.

i also don't see any reason to spend any time on nvidia.  arguments
alluding to how other companies have opened up in other areas
don't cut it for me.  show me the docs!  (i couldn't find any on
nvidia's web site.  might have missed them?)

the kirkwood can be interesting.  and i've written a couple of
drivers for it, but it often doesn't fit my needs (not enough
sata ports) and i'm not comfortable depending on it.
the hardware doesn't appear reliable.  it runs too hot.

now the pc platform, for all its many flaws, has answers for all
my questions.
- i can buy nearly any chassis i want and mate it with any power
supply and nearly any motherboard i want.  i can get as many nics
or sata ports as i wish.  i can plug as much memory in as i want.
i can get consumer or workstation grade components.  &c.
- i can run old os code on new architecture processors
- and, it's (mostly, except for stuff like i²c) plug-and-play.

the arm universe doesn't have answers to these questions, and
i think it's going to be an impediment until some of these
questions are answered.

if you want to be a cynic, a non-pluggable architecture is super
for hardware companies.  they can segment the heck out of
the market and get to the bad old says of charging big bucks
for little extra features.  since there's no way to add them yourselves.

- erik