Bell Tech?
Jonathan Broome
jon at wilbur.uucp
Sat Aug 12 15:41:47 AEST 1989
In article <1156 at mitisft.Convergent.COM> markb at mitisft.Convergent.COM (Mark Beyer) writes:
: My impression is that the BLIT works with nothing but the Bell Tech hardware
: and with their Unix. My hope is that Intel will try to get
: the BLIT to work with a wider range of systems.
I use the Blit in a Compaq 20e and a CSS Labs Magnum 25 every day. I know
other people using Blits in ALRs, Compaq DeskPros, Zeniths, and yes, even Bell
Tech boxes. We all use 386/ix and ISC's X11.
: Not wanting to wait for that, I gave up on the BLIT and went to a
: comparably priced Sigma Designs LaserView, which came up in a few hours
: and works just fine. The BLIT is gathering dust under my desk.
The Blit performance is much better than the LaserView -- the Blit has a
processor that allows offloading some of graphics ops, while the Sigma is
essentially just a dumb frame buffer that has to bank switches its memory into
the host's address space and forces the CPU do ALL the work. Using the
(admittedly simplistic) "benchmark" mentioned here a few months ago of using
"/bin/time cat /etc/termcap" (6x10 font, jump scroll off, 89000 bytes, Compaq
20MHz systems), the Blit takes just under one-third the time of the Sigma (34.5
seconds vs 1:46.2) It might be worth dusting off that Blit.
---Jonathan Broome
jon at wilbur.uucp
More information about the Comp.unix.i386
mailing list