> >The Alpha machines are not THAT expensive (relatively, of course). A
> The
> >Microway "Screamer 533", 533MHz, 4.3GB Seagate Barracuda UW-SCSI, 8x
> IDE
> >CD-ROM, 2MB Matrox Millenium, Adaptec 2940 UW-SCSI, 128MB RAM, 2MB SRAM
> cache,
> >4 PCI slots and 2 ISA slots costs $2,995 US (see The Linux Journal, Jan
> 1998,
> >p.44). For such a machine the price isn't that high - and I daresay it
> will
> >get lower with time.
>
>
> But, do you want to exclude anybody who happens to buy a sub-US$1000
> PC from ever using Linux? Some people do see the light too late, and
> $2995
There US$1000 Alphas too and they're getting cheaper.
> is still too much for the average student. If you need a workstation to
> do
> your programming classwork on, you've just said that it's cheaper to buy
> a cheap PC, WinNT or 98, and Microsoft's Visual Studio (Education price,
> of course) than to buy a machine that can run Linux.
>
> That's plain and simple arrogance.
No, don't get me wrong. It wasn't what I meant - I just wanted to show that
there are other, relatively affordable, machines that can be used with Linux -
that you will have a choice, that you won't be given life sentence with
Intel-based PCs wit Windows-compatible hardware ONLY.
> >> find that the graphics card market only has two options:
> >>
> >> 1) "shitty cards designed for Windows 98"
> >I really don't think so. The PC (be it Alpha or Intel or whatever)
> hardware
> >will get cheaper and even more affordable - and not all of this
> hardware will
> >run Windows 98 - especially not the Alphas. And I doubt that they will
> use
> >only the high-end video hardware, and that's just because not everyone
> (or,
> >perhaps better, not so many people) need such sophisticated graphics.
>
>
> Economics 101. Sun, SGI, etc will hack drivers for these cards, simply
> because
> non-x86 machines are only 8% of the market (from my memory).
>
> Beyond that, just because it's "Designed for Windows XX" does *not* mean
> that it's impossible to write an X server for it (or a KGI driver, or
> fbcon... I
> don't feel that there's enough solid information to decide yet). It
> just means
> that it's more difficult in some cases.
>
> GUI accelarators will still have basic functions: put a pixel, put an
> image, etc.
> Why wouldn't you be able to use these functions from something other
> than
> Windows?
Beause you might not be allowed to do so for legal reasons. Look at the HP
printers and their proprietary M$ protocols, which have been mentioned
elsewhere in this thread. Do you think it might not happen for video cards or
at the least for the software interfaces that are *required* for them to work?
If M$ (or any other company for that matter) copyrights them you'll have to
pay for the licence and Linux will no longer be free.
> >white, you can always stay halfway between two points. What you said
> suggests
> >that WIndows will totally overtake the PC market - then why bother with
> Linux
> >I ask?
>
>
> I'm not saying that it's better to have cards that don't have text mode,
> or anything
> like that. I'm saying that people who have those (broken) cards should
> not be
> excluded from using Linux.
And did I say they should? I'm just saying it may get really hard to use them
(save for the legal reasons) without converting Linux to a Windows emulator -
if the hardware will continue to go in that direction.
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