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Article #21906Re: The Killer Micro From Hell [Rea
From: gillies
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 1990 17:28
Date: Tue, 02 Jan 1990 17:28
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1258 bytes
I think that performance/price is a stupid metric for supercomputers. Your lifetime is a very fixed resource. Why do we all drive cars? A cheap car costs $8000 and goes 65 mph. But a decent bicycle costs $400 and goes 12 mph (with minimal effort). Therefore, the relative price/kilobuck ratios are: Car: 65/8 = 8.125 MPHs/Kbuck Bike: 12/.4 = 30 MPHs/Kbuck Obviously, bicycles enjoy a 3.5* better performance/price ratio, and we haven't even considered the health benefits. So why do most people drive cars? I see two reasons. First, cars have a higher I/O rate (you can put a whole load of groceries in a car, and 3 children too). But that is not the main reason. The main reason is that the old adage "time is money" is false. ---> Time is money^2
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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!dino!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!m.cs.uiuc.edu!p.cs.uiuc.edu!gillies From: gillies@p.cs.uiuc.edu Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: The Killer Micro From Hell [Rea Message-ID: <76700104@p.cs.uiuc.edu> Date: 2 Jan 90 17:28:49 GMT References: <791@stat.fsu.edu> Lines: 22 Nf-ID: #R:stat.fsu.edu:791:p.cs.uiuc.edu:76700104:000:767 Nf-From: p.cs.uiuc.edu!gillies Jan 1 15:47:00 1990