Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!watmath!maytag!watdcsu!pfratar From: pfratar@watdcsu.waterloo.edu (Paul Frattaroli - DCS) Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d Subject: Re: Need of Demos and X Message-ID: <6381@watdcsu.waterloo.edu> Date: 26 Sep 89 14:06:31 GMT References: <10017@xanth.cs.odu.edu> <12043@boulder.Colorado.EDU> <14625@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> Reply-To: pfratar@watdcsu.waterloo.edu (Paul Frattaroli - DCS) Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario Lines: 49 In article <14625@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> tuna@athena.mit.edu (Kirk 'UhOh' Johnson) writes: >In article <10017@xanth.cs.odu.edu> wayne@cs.odu.edu writes: >% >% at the moment) Also, this is for me, does anyone know if X windows >% exsist for a PC? > >In article <12043@boulder.Colorado.EDU> gordon@boulder.Colorado.EDU replys: >% >% X-windows does run but on 386 class machines under Unix. Some >% versions of Unix will allow MS-DOS applications to run as well. > >at the moment, but i'm pretty sure one of them was even from IBM. > >kirk Hello, Yes, one is from IBM, my friend has it running on his model 70. ( He also has AIX for PS/2 386's and PC TCP/IP running also ). I think however, that you need MCA to run the IBM version and VGA and '386. It isn't bad, even having to run the X client on another machine, with your PC as the X Window Server. But, it is a bit cramped for space. Since X was designed for bitmapped screens, ( and most Workstations nowdays have resolutions on the order of 1152 x 948 ) the 640 x 480 of VGA just doesn't measure up ( and IBM wrote this so SVGA isn't supported since it isn't their standard ). Subsequently, some programs for X, that use an 1152 x 948 bitmap image will only display the top left quarter on a PS/2 ( for example xphoon ). Now, for the cost.... The microcomputer store here on campus sells X-Windows for the PS/2 for $181 ( CDN ). I am not sure however, if it runs under DOS or if you need AIX. Probably the latter. ( AIX sells for $671 ) You probably also need Ethernet, to connect to a remote host to run client applications. X does a lot of communicating between client and server, and even at 9600 baud it would be very very very sssslllloooowwww!!! And as for memory requirements, my friend has 4 Megs. in his PS/2 70, and there is still MAJOR disk swapping when running AIX and X and occasionally it hangs. All in all, I don't think it's worth it ( IMHO only ). At least not yet anyway, it is still young though. ....Paul F -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul Frattaroli - Department of Computing Services University of Waterloo < pfratar@watshine.waterloo.edu > < pfratar@watdcsu.waterloo.edu >