GX, CXP & GXP

[Emili Sanroma, Institut de Cibernetica UPC-CSIC]

We are having problems at our site with Sun Graphic Cards. It seems that
Sun does not sell a graphics card like we need. We are working on several
different projects and we want to work on any project at any station, not
only graphics on one and lisp on another.  In addition to this, we had a
GXP that runs well, but which does not support the new standards like Open
Windows. That is part of the problem.  Which card do we really need, and
what can we do in the future with the hardware that Sun will not support ?

I know some of the characteristics of the current Sun cards:

			GX		GXP		CXP
====================================================================
cards		        CG6		CG9+GP2		CG5+GP2
LISP			yes		NO !!		yes
CORE			NO		NO		yes
PHIGS, GKS		yes		yes		yes
OPEN WINDOWS		yes		NO		NO
HARD DOUBLE BUFFER	NO		NO		yes
vect/s 2D		400K            --              200K
vect/s 3D               175K             90K            150K
pol/s (gouraud)          40K            5'5K             20K


The problem is, we are using CORE, although we could change to PHIGS, and
we use lisp, we want speed in graphics, and we would like to use X11.
Obviously there is not a Sun card that can support all of this things.  I
have asked SUN's technical support (hotline at sun.com) but they have not
given their response.  The best solution seems to be to change to the GX
card and change our programs from core to phigs, but GX is only one card,
does not have a double buffer, and it's cheaper than the others.  Can it
really be faster?

Could you tell me if SUN is thinking of making a patch for GXP to support
lisp or X11, or a patch for GXP, or of making a new, faster GX with or
without core, and if a GX without double buffer hardware really runs
faster with dynamic graphics, such as with images of robots in real time.
I would appreciate your answer.

Please send answers directly to me.

			Emili Sanrom`.
			Institut de Cibernhtica. Barcelona. Espanya.
			sanroma at ic.upc.es         (ean)
                        sanroma%ciber at ic.upc.es
			sanroma at EBRUPC51.BITNET