Aucbvax.2667
fa.works
utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!works
Thu Aug 13 05:02:58 1981
WorkS Digest V1 #5
>From DUFFEY@MIT-AI Thu Aug 13 04:55:01 1981
WorkS Digest Thu, 13 Aug 1981 Volume 1 : Issue 5
Today's Topics:
Reply - Micro Benchmarks, FYI - IBM's Personal Computer
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 12 Aug 1981 2246-PDT
From: Stevan Milunovic <MILUNOVIC SRI-KL AT>
Subject: Micro Benchmarks Results
Many thanks to those who responded to the micro benchmark query.
I have summarized the benchmarks reported in the April 1/81 issue
of EDN, but the article should be read for details concerning the
benchmarks. It appears that the 68000 is the hands down winner,
unless you need floating point processing and can't wait for the
chip (floating point benchmarks were not performed in the report).
I have appended messages (edited to remove redundancy) from those
who responded to the query.
Benchmark tests were compiled at CMU in 1976, and coded by each
manufacturer.
MICRO | LSI-11/23 | 8086 | 68000 | Z8000 |
-------------+------------+-------------+-------------+-------------+
BENCHMARK | Code| Time | Code| Time | Code| Time | Code| Time |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
I/O Interrupt| 20 | 114 | 55 | 126 | 24 | 33 | 18 | 42 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
I/O w/FIFO | 86 | 1196 | 85 | 348 | 118 | 390 | 106 | 436 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Char. Search | 76 | 996 | 70 | 193 | 44 | 244 | 66 | 237 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Bit Ops | 70 | 799 | 46 | 122 | 36 | 70 | 44 | 123 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Linked List | 138 | 592 | 94 | - | 106 | 153 | 96 | 237 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Quicksort | - | - | 347 |1.2E^5 | 266 |3.3E^4 | 386 |1.2E^5 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Bit Matrix | 152 | 1517 | 88 | 820 | 74 | 368 | 110 | 646 |
-------------+-----+------+-----+-------+-----+-------+-----+-------+
Clock time: LSI-11/23 = 3.3 MHz
8086 = 10.0 MHz
68000 = 10.0 MHz
Z8000 = 6.0 MHz
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Frank J. Wancho <FJW MIT-MC AT>
Subject: Micro Benchmarks
ComputerWorld has been running a series of benchmark articles
over the last six months or more and periodically publish
accumulated summaries of the results in each category.
--Frank
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Nowicki at PARC-MAXC
Subject: Re: WorkS Digest V1 #4
Forest Baskett has the famous "Baskett Benchmark" that has been
run on machines like Dorados, Dolphins, Altos, 10s, 20s, Vaxen,
and MC68000 in both C, "hacked" C and Pascal. The results
are very informative. I would like to see the results on other
microcomputers. By the way, we get almost 40% VAX/780 performance
on the 8 MHz 68000 in this test, which is a small, integer only,
compute bound puzzle solver.
-- Bill
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: CAIN at SRI-AI
Subject: Micro benchmarks
The April 1, 1981 issue of EDN has a number of benchmarks
between the LSI-11/23, the 68000, the Z8000, and the 8086.
They are taken from a more complete study done at CMU which
I was hoping to find one of these days.
Since these benchmarks omitted floating point tests, I
performed a couple informal ones on a 68000 with Doug Beck
here at SRI. To do 10000 iterations of a floating point add,
subtract, multiply, and divide took 71 seconds (implying 1.75
milliseconds per operation) using Whitesmith's C compiler and
104 seconds using Motorola's PASCAL compiler.
When talking to Motorola about this sluggish performance,
they mentioned that the 68000 has a fast floating point PROM
in development which has done floating-point multiplications
(in software!) in 35 micro seconds. This compares very well
with the LSI-11/23's floating point hardware times.
Also C makes all floating point numbers to double precision
before doing the implied operation, meaning much of that 71
seconds was devoted in going "float-to-double" and
"double-to-float". According to my calculations, the 68000
is capable of that 35 microsecond time easily (roughly 100
to 150 clock states would be required), and since it has the
most support (cross compilers on the VAX, etc), I think it is
the preferable chip. It is promised that the floating-point
support will be built onto the chip mask so that some new
instructions will manipulate floating point numbers directly.
I am seriously weighing the choice of VAX vs 68000 for a new
project (where cost may outweigh the greater power of the VAX).
... Ron
----------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: 12 Aug 1981 2130-PDT
From: Charles B. Weinstock <WEINSTOCK SRI-KL AT>
Subject: New IBM Personal Computer
Business Day : IBM Personal Computer
By ANDREW POLLACK
c. 1981 N.Y. Times News Service
NEW YORK - The International Business Machines Corp., the
giant of the computer industry, is thinking smaller: Wednesday
it introduced a personal desk-top computer for use at home,
in schools and in business.
Although the announcement had been expected for months,
it still sent reverberations through the industry.
Besides representing a dramatic change in image for IBM and
marking its entry into consumer electronics, the endorsement
of personal machines by a company whose name is practically
synonymous with computers is expected to stimulate the growth
of the business.
And IBM could pose the stiffest challenge yet to Apple
Computer Inc. and the Tandy Corp.'s Radio Shack division,
the current leading vendors.
"It's one of the most important announcements we've seen
in the industry," said Christopher Morgan, editor in chief of
Byte, a personal computer magazine.
"People will now know that personal computers are not a fad
or a flash in the pan," said Michael McConnell, executive vice
president of Computerland, a chain of a retail stores that will
market the new IBM products.
The price of the machines will range from $1,565, for a
simple system that will require users to provide their own
television screens and cassette tapes, to more than $6,000 for
the most elaborate versions. In addition to Computerland, the
line will be sold through several new business-machine stores
being started by Sears, Roebuck & Co., by IBM's own three retail
stores and directly by IBM to large corporations.
By most accounts of analysts and others connected with
the personal computer business, IBM's machine is impressive
technologically, not because of any single breakthrough, but
because of a combination of good features and sound engineering.
The new model uses a microprocessor capable of handling
16 bits of information at a time, which will permit the machine
to handle data more quickly and perform more complex tasks than
most other personal computers, which have 8-bit microprocessors.
The machine, depending on the model, can store 16,000 to more
that 260,000 characters in its memory.
But analysts disagreed on whether the price would be low
enough to knock Apple or Tandy out of the ring.
In Fort Worth, Garland P. Asher, chief of financial planning
for Tandy, said he was relieved in two ways. "I'm relieved that
whatever they were going to do, they finally did it," he said.
"I'm certainly relieved at the pricing. They haven't introduced
anything that's going to rewrite the ground rules."
Comparing prices is difficult, however, because the machines
come in different configurations and are not directly comparable.
McConnell, of Computerland, which sells both Apple machines and
the IBM home computer, said that in some typical configurations
the IBM machine was several hundred dollars more expensive than
the Apple II, Apple's popular brand. Yet the IBM device is
slightly less expensive than a typical configuration of the
newer, more powerful Apple III.
Other factors such as the availability of programs for the
computer and marketing are equally important, analysts said. IBM
will have fewer retail outlets and fewer programs initially than
Apple and Radio Shack. Yet, Aaron Goldberg, an analyst with the
International Data Corp., a Framingham, Mass., consulting firm,
said IBM's direct sales staff could be a potent force in selling
to leading industrial companies, who might buy dozens of desk-top
computers at a time.
Chances are, there will be room for all the companies, many
analysts believe. The personal computer market is growing
explosively, although accurate figures are hard to get because
there is no clear distinction between home computers, personal
computers for other users and desk-top computers designed for
business use.
International Data estimates that 327,000 desk-top computers,
ranging in price from several hundred dollars to $20,000, were
sold in the United States in 1980, and projects that this total
will increase to 1.3 million by 1985. In dollar volume, the
market is expected to grow from $2.4 billion last year to $9
billion in1985.
According to estimates by International Data and others,
there are approximately a million personal computers in use,
with the largest application being for business and professional
uses. The home and education markets are still small, but are
expected to explode.
When the new computer becomes available in October, the
program offerings will include Visicalc, a popular business
forecasting program; three business and accounting packages
by Peachtree Software; Easywriter, a word-processing package,
and Microsoft Adventure, a fantasy game. The software,
however, will sell in some cases for about twice the price
of the equivalent programs sold for use on other machines.
IBM is also allowing anyone else who wants to do so to
write programs for the IBM machine, which the company would
evaluate. If the programs were accepted for marketing, the
writer would be paid a royalty on sales of the program.
A veritable cottage industry of computer buffs has sprung
up to write programs for other personal computers, and the
abundance of such home-grown programs is largely responsible
for the market strength of the Apple and Tandy computers.
IBM also said it would make its computers nearly compatible
with some other home computers, so programs written for those
machines could be transferred to the IBM model.
------------------------------
End of WorkS Digest
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