Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!elsie!imsvax!ted From: ted@imsvax.UUCP (Ted Holden) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: Mainframe vs Micro Message-ID: <657@imsvax.UUCP> Date: Sat, 3-Jan-87 00:03:42 EST Article-I.D.: imsvax.657 Posted: Sat Jan 3 00:03:42 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 3-Jan-87 02:50:05 EST Organization: IMS Inc, Rockville MD Lines: 27 There are several points to consider concerning the mainframe/micro question as it relates to databases. The 32 meg limit doesn't apply to Novell Netware. A Novell server can fully use big disks such as the 300 meg Cores. Such a server can use several meg of ram as a cache area and adequately service 30 or so users. The neat thing is that the entire compute load has been put on the individual PCs; the server is only being required to fetch and store info to and from disk. As servers get more powerful, using 386 and future chips, and storage medea gets better, presumably using laser technologies, it is easy to anticipate such systems replacing mainframes for most if not all database work. The little ISI glass disks are available now for something like $2500, 256 meg disks going for $100, 1 ms track to track seek time. That's fast! I've seen 750 and 780 VAXs destroyed by fewer than 30 people doing database work (or attempting same) at the same time. The PCs are faster and better. The PC revolution, like our free-market system as opposed to communism, takes human nature into account, at least as it applies to bosses and managers. I've never yet seen one of these who, upon hiring three new people to work on a multi-user computer system, didn't simply add three new terminals to the system. With PC networks, they are forced to add three new computers to the system. And the beauty is that they do so with smiles on their faces, since PCs have gotten to the point of being cheaper than most mainframe terminals anyhow. Ted Holden IMS