hardware requirements

[Conor P. Cahill]

Boy, when you ask questions you certainly ask a mouthfull...

In article <28346 at usc> kjh at pollux.usc.edu (Kenneth J. Hendrickson) writes:
>How do I find out what versions of Unix support what kinds of hardware,
>and require what kinds of hardware?  I want unix, but I'd like to be
>able to upgrade slowly - using as much existing hardware as possible.

For particular hardware compatibility you ask the vendor which will only 
be able to tell you things that are known to work.  That doesn't mean
that you will have no problems with that hardware and it doesn't mean
that you will have problems with hardware that is not on that list.

>What kind of performance can you get with VGA 800x600 & X?  1024x768?

Vga performance is kind of slow and it gets slower the deeper the 
display (the more bits used for color).

>I'd like a couple of windows sized 60x80.  Is this possible?

It is possible, but under VGA either the font would be unreadable or
the windows would runn off the display.  For this kind of windows you
need at least a megapixel display on a 19" or greater screen.

> Does X run a lot better with a co-processor?

Yes definately.  However, your choice of an OS may limit you to the
choices of graphics cards.  Currently ISC supports the most cards.

> Can I get by with a Microsoft 2-button mouse, at least for a short time?

Yes.

>How much disk space is required/recommended for various versions of
>Unix?

Most, if not all, of them require the same amount of space for the
same configurations.

> How much does the system itself require?

A full blown system with X, SDS, etc, etc can eat up close to 100MB.

> How much should be allocated for swap space?

At least twice the amount of memory you have and if you are real
short on memory, then as much as three times.

> How much memory is required/recommended?

At least 8MB if you plan to run X.  4MB otherwise.

>I am willing to totally give up DOS.  However, I understand that there
>are things like Merge and/or VP/ix; how well do they work?  What DOS
>programs can be used with these?  How doslike are these DOS shells?

My experience is with VP/IX, but you can assume that the same will
be true for dos MERGE.

Most DOS programs (yes, even dirty ones) will work correctly under 
these shells.  The problems you get into are with programs that
run in protected mode (like windows386 or OS/2).

These are not DOS shells.  They are programs that envoke the 8086 real
mode and run a full blown MS-DOS (version 3.x).  You are running under
a real command.com and you can even directly access the dos partition
on the hard disk, or access the unix files as a network file system or
have a unix file appear as the hard disk.


>I notice that all the PC benchmarks seem to be 16 bits only.  You can
>see that the performance is directly related to clock speed for all
>machines above a '286 (with better performance with a cache).  Do any of
>the Unixes out there directly support the 32-bit '386?  (What my
>question really is is "will I get significantly better performance from
>a 386-dx than a 386-sx, if the clock speeds are similar?")  Should I buy
>a 386-dx?

The 386 unix products use the full 32 bits.  You will have much
better performance from a dx than an sx.

>I will probably be the only user of the system.  However, getting the
>2-user system seems scary.  What do you give up?  Is the kernel
>crippled?  What is to prevent one from just adding to /etc/passwd?

The only thing that is crippled is that you cannot have more than two
access points to the system activated at the same time.  An access point
will include the console (and its extra VTs), a serial tty, a network
tty).

You can have as many users as you wish defined in /etc/passwd.  Only 
two of them (or one of them logged into multiple access points) will
be able to access the system at the same time.

>Why should I get V.4?

If you are planning to use this system in a production environment where
stability of the system is important, you should wait a while for SVR4 to
stablize or get SVR3.2.


-- 
Conor P. Cahill            (703)430-9247        Virtual Technologies, Inc.,
uunet!virtech!cpcahil                           46030 Manekin Plaza, Suite 160
                                                Sterling, VA 22170