For some time now, I've been thinking of getting some sort of
Symbolics machine. I'd really prefer something that could use SCSI
disk(s) and standard monitors; I believe this means either a MacIvory
or an NPX (which I would access through an X-Windows session).
I've been in touch with David Schmidt, who handles maintenance
for Symbolics hardware. He made me an offer on a MacIvory II at what
seems to be a reasonable price. I'll probably go for this, unless
someone offers me a MacIvory III or an NPX at a price I can live with
:-)
Does anybody have such a beast that they're willing to part
with?
I may also be interested in a Symbolics keyboard with the ADB
breakout box (for a MacIvory) and additional RAM (for MacIvory II or
III, depending on what I can get hold of.)
--
Raymond Wiker
·············@fast.no
In article <··············@raw.grenland.fast.no>, Raymond Wiker
<·············@fast.no> wrote:
> For some time now, I've been thinking of getting some sort of
> Symbolics machine. I'd really prefer something that could use SCSI
> disk(s) and standard monitors; I believe this means either a MacIvory
> or an NPX (which I would access through an X-Windows session).
>
> I've been in touch with David Schmidt, who handles maintenance
> for Symbolics hardware. He made me an offer on a MacIvory II at what
> seems to be a reasonable price. I'll probably go for this, unless
> someone offers me a MacIvory III or an NPX at a price I can live with
> :-)
>
> Does anybody have such a beast that they're willing to part
> with?
>
> I may also be interested in a Symbolics keyboard with the ADB
> breakout box (for a MacIvory) and additional RAM (for MacIvory II or
> III, depending on what I can get hold of.)
Old Symbolics hardware is really getting outdated.
My PowerBook is roughly 10-25 times faster than my
MacIvory for Lisp - more if a lot of memory
is needed - due to less swapping on the Mac.
Depending on your budget and your plans, Open Genera
is an option. Open Genera runs on top of an Alpha+Tru64Unix
machine.
+ modern Alpha hardware is available
+ Open Genera on Alpha is **much** faster than a MacIvory
or a NXP 1000 (altleast ten times)
+ Alpha machines can be equipped with large amounts of RAM
+ you can run multiple Open Genera emulations on one machine
and access them via X11
- a bit more expensive
Rainer Joswig
--
Rainer Joswig, Hamburg, Germany
Email: ·············@corporate-world.lisp.de
Web: http://corporate-world.lisp.de/
Rainer Joswig <······@corporate-world.lisp.de> writes:
> Old Symbolics hardware is really getting outdated.
> My PowerBook is roughly 10-25 times faster than my
> MacIvory for Lisp - more if a lot of memory
> is needed - due to less swapping on the Mac.
I'm not too concerned about speed - I just want a fairly
complete Lisp environment to learn "the Lisp way" on. A MacIvory II
would cost me less than the alternatives, and would be more complete
in most respects. There's always the chance that I have been spoiled
by modern hardware to the extent that working with slower hardware is
going to be painful, but I'm hoping that incremental compilation etc
will help here.
> Depending on your budget and your plans, Open Genera
> is an option. Open Genera runs on top of an Alpha+Tru64Unix
> machine.
>
> + modern Alpha hardware is available
> + Open Genera on Alpha is **much** faster than a MacIvory
> or a NXP 1000 (altleast ten times)
> + Alpha machines can be equipped with large amounts of RAM
> + you can run multiple Open Genera emulations on one machine
> and access them via X11
>
> - a bit more expensive
Quite a bit more, no? I haven't seen any "official" prices for
Open Genera, but I've seen indications of about $5000 for the whole
system. Add the cost of a suitable Alpha machine (at least $500, I
guess), and that's *way* above what I'm willing to cough up for what is
basically a hobby system :-(
--
Raymond Wiker
·············@fast.no
In article <··············@raw.grenland.fast.no>,
Raymond Wiker <·············@fast.no> wrote:
> Rainer Joswig <······@corporate-world.lisp.de> writes:
> > Old Symbolics hardware is really getting outdated.
> > My PowerBook is roughly 10-25 times faster than my
> > MacIvory for Lisp - more if a lot of memory
> > is needed - due to less swapping on the Mac.
>
> I'm not too concerned about speed - I just want a fairly
> complete Lisp environment to learn "the Lisp way" on. A MacIvory II
> would cost me less than the alternatives, and would be more complete
> in most respects. There's always the chance that I have been spoiled
> by modern hardware to the extent that working with slower hardware is
> going to be painful, but I'm hoping that incremental compilation etc
> will help here.
It does help a bit. It helps if your expectations (speedwise) aren't
too high :-) I just picked up an XL1200 from Dave Schmidt a few weeks
ago, and it seems reasonably quick to me, but my other "toy" machine is
a 33mhz NeXT :-) From what I remember from my experience 10 yrs ago,
the macivory systems were quite a bit slower than my XL1200, though.
> > Depending on your budget and your plans, Open Genera
> > is an option. Open Genera runs on top of an Alpha+Tru64Unix
> > machine.
>
> Quite a bit more, no? I haven't seen any "official" prices for
> Open Genera, but I've seen indications of about $5000 for the whole
> system. Add the cost of a suitable Alpha machine (at least $500, I
> guess), and that's *way* above what I'm willing to cough up for what
is
> basically a hobby system :-(
That was my take as well. I was just looking for a machine to relive
those blissful college terms spent banging on those old 3645's.
It really is a shame Symbolics never ported the VLM to IA32. Even with
only half the width of an Alpha, 1+ Ghz and superscalar execution should
still blow away an old Ivory. Even a VLM-in-C should beat an Ivory
handily.
If you've never administered a LISPM, prepare to be frustrated by the
initial configuration process. The otherwise excellent documentation is
a bit sparse in this area.
Sent via Deja.com
http://www.deja.com/
In article <··············@raw.grenland.fast.no>,
Raymond Wiker <·············@fast.no> wrote:
> I'm not too concerned about speed - I just want a fairly
> complete Lisp environment to learn "the Lisp way" on. A MacIvory II
> would cost me less than the alternatives, and would be more complete
> in most respects. There's always the chance that I have been spoiled
> by modern hardware to the extent that working with slower hardware is
> going to be painful, but I'm hoping that incremental compilation etc
> will help here.
For learning, this is a good choice. (Though, a standalone Lisp
machine would keep you warm in the winter. ;-) )
Fare Rideau has written down his way to a MacIvory so far:
http://fare.tunes.org/LispM.html
> > - a bit more expensive
>
> Quite a bit more, no? I haven't seen any "official" prices for
> Open Genera, but I've seen indications of about $5000 for the whole
> system.
That's right. And this is even cheap compared to some Unix-based
Lisp offerings.
> Add the cost of a suitable Alpha machine (at least $500, I
> guess), and that's *way* above what I'm willing to cough up for what is
> basically a hobby system :-(
For a hobby this might be expensive. Actually I spent much more
money for my addic^h^h^h^h^h hobby already. If it would be
more than just for "learning", I'd see it also as a good investment,
usable for several years. I'm always amazed that some people
in this "business" have really expensive cars, multichannel home
theaters, etc. and their computer equipment is based on, well, just
the most ordinary PC you can imagine.
If you want to know more about "the Lisp way" - a MacIvory is
a good choice. If you want to *go* the Lisp way - get
Open Genera. ;-)
Rainer Joswig
Sent via Deja.com
http://www.deja.com/
······@corporate-world.lisp.de writes:
> In article <··············@raw.grenland.fast.no>,
> Raymond Wiker <·············@fast.no> wrote:
>
> > I'm not too concerned about speed - I just want a fairly
> > complete Lisp environment to learn "the Lisp way" on. A MacIvory II
> > would cost me less than the alternatives, and would be more complete
> > in most respects. There's always the chance that I have been spoiled
> > by modern hardware to the extent that working with slower hardware is
> > going to be painful, but I'm hoping that incremental compilation etc
> > will help here.
>
> For learning, this is a good choice. (Though, a standalone Lisp
> machine would keep you warm in the winter. ;-) )
Hum... maybe I should get a 3640, put it outside and see if it
would get rid of all this !$#% snow.
> Fare Rideau has written down his way to a MacIvory so far:
>
> http://fare.tunes.org/LispM.html
I looked at this earlier today - it answered quite a few of my
questions (including some that I didn't even know I had :-)
[ Snip ]
> If you want to know more about "the Lisp way" - a MacIvory is
> a good choice. If you want to *go* the Lisp way - get
> Open Genera. ;-)
Hum. Maybe I'd better start saving, then...
--
Raymond Wiker
·············@fast.no
* Raymond Wiker wrote:
> For some time now, I've been thinking of getting some sort of
> Symbolics machine. I'd really prefer something that could use SCSI
> disk(s) and standard monitors; I believe this means either a MacIvory
> or an NPX (which I would access through an X-Windows session).
NXP you mean, not NPX.
I think that all the Ivory based machines had SCSI, so things like
XL400 and XL1200s are also possibilities. They're considerably bigger
boxes of course, and you need a Symbolics screen to use them, which
means old and expensive-to-replace monitors. They might be more
available though.
I think that any of the machines which have their own disk interfaces
(which means anything but the embedded ones, I think, so not
macivory), may place slightly special requirements on disks, as the
sector sizes are weird. But I may be wrong about that. Certainly my
NXP1000 has a fairly ordinary SCSI disk (9Gb Seagate Barracuda) which
works fine.
--tim
In article <···············@cley.com>, Tim Bradshaw <···@cley.com>
wrote:
> * Raymond Wiker wrote:
> > For some time now, I've been thinking of getting some sort of
> > Symbolics machine. I'd really prefer something that could use SCSI
> > disk(s) and standard monitors; I believe this means either a MacIvory
> > or an NPX (which I would access through an X-Windows session).
>
> NXP you mean, not NPX.
>
> I think that all the Ivory based machines had SCSI, so things like
> XL400 and XL1200s are also possibilities. They're considerably bigger
> boxes of course, and you need a Symbolics screen to use them,
Actually I think there was an adapter (pizza box sized console
without monitor) for using "ordinary" screens - I have never
seen one in real live - only pictures. This seems to be showing one:
http://kogs-www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/~moeller/symbolics-info/symbolics-images/xl1200-3.jpg
--
Rainer Joswig, Hamburg, Germany
Email: ·············@corporate-world.lisp.de
Web: http://corporate-world.lisp.de/