Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 10:40:55 10/22/97
Go up one level in this thread
On October 22, 1997 at 09:52:14, Will Willis wrote: >Bob Hyatt wrote: >>I'm not defending myself period. track down the original alpha users, >>the >>programmers that are taking PII/300's, and so forth, as they are the >>ones >>that led me to search for something faster. I don't consider the alpha >>a >>"tournament winning advantage". I consider it a "avoiding tournament >>disadvantage" issue. There *is* a *huge* difference... >> >> > I think the major sticking point here lies with your definition of >"avoiding tournament disadvantage" vs. theirs. You're saying (if I'm >correct) that others in the past have kept raising the hardware levels >in order to gain an advantage, and you were planning on using a K6-233 >until you heard about programmers who were taking PII-300's (right so >far?). Therefore you decided to "level the playing field" so to speak >by switching to an Alpha. But why a 766mhz Alpha? Why not a 500 or >whatever the current Alpha that "power users" are using? We had asked Digital for an alpha loaner. Currently, their best workstation box is a 600mhz processor. They initially told us they would not be able to supply us with a machine. We then contacted Kryotech, and they said "maybe". They are sending 3 machines to Paris, one for Dark Thought, one for Ferret, and a backup in case either machine arrives dead, or goes down during the tournament. If all 3 arrive alive, we can use the 3rd, with the proviso that if either of the other two go down, we lose it to replace the defective machine. We then pursued other contacts with Digital, and are getting a 500mhz alpha (which is a relatively common variation) shipped to us for use in Paris. This is the machine we will most likely be running on. It's the only machine we have actually run on to date as well, in testing. I have zero Kryotech numbers for performance... > To be honest >I'm not up on the Alpha processors as much as the x86 based ones, but it >seems to me anyway that you've gone right past "avoiding tournament >disadvantage" to "obtaining decisive hardware advantage." I'm not >making any value judgements either way, obviously under the current >system you are free to use the fastest hardware you can get your hands >on. I'm just pointing out what seems to have been hinted at for some >time but not said outright. I'm not sure I follow. Two other programs are using 766 machines for certain. So how do I keep up with them, without passing up some others? IE I'm not trying to find a machine just a little better than the worst machine, I'm trying to find a machine as good as the best one there, to maximize my chances... So I don't see how I have "gone right past..." when *if* I get a 766, I will just barely "catch up" to the leaders... But the chances for a 766 are pretty slim at present, anyway... and I'm not sure we want to have to deal with the potential dead-machine problem where we would have to stop in the middle of a game to switch to our /500 alpha should one of the other two break down. We might simply elect to stick with the 500 for the whole event... > > <--Will-->
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