RE: [ql-users] One box or two
Duncan Neithercut wrote: My advice is to get both but as a human you might not notice major differences in performance between your two systems. The benchmarks also show that for running QDOS/SMSQ/E the Q60 is up there head to head with state of the art PC hardware. The question is how can SMSQ/E be run even faster on native hardware as PC hardware will go faster and faster as time goes by - multiple 68060 processors on a Q60 board? Short term: Faster RAM More overclocking An externel RAM cache Longer term: A new 680x0 processor (microcode?). http://tech-www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/vhdl/models/m68000/m6800.vhd -- Tarquin Mills ACCUS (Anglia Classic Computer Users Society) http://www.planet14.sonow4u.co.uk/comp/accus/
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
- Original Message - From: Derek Stewart [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, November 22, 2002 10:36 PM Subject: Re: [ql-users] One box or two Hi Bill, Why not have both boxes ?? I have both a Q60 and QPC2 v3 (recently updated at the London Show), which just does to show you can have both systems running. OK, I am part of the firm making the Q60, but I do not see why, I can not support all the software writers and other hardware manufacturers, as you see I like the QL in what ever shape or form it takes. Derek Yes I think I'm going that way, QPC first though ( cause my Christmas card list is a _dbf file and this year I mean to do it before the final posting date) Q60 in the spring methinks. BTW Roy I found a Celeron 1.7 gig that works on socket 370. gotta confirm my board will drive it at that speed though( boy dig this PC talk, you could be forgiven for thinking I know what I'm talking about) Enough of this blasphemy All the best - Bill
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
To use ProWess, you need speed . Yes but not that much. It ran fine on my Q40 (when the writeback cache was turned off that is) . On my laptop (800MHz celeron), BlaqBox (667MHz Via) and main PC (1.6GHz P4) it is a bit faster but I could use it OK on the Q 40. Most of the speed loss is in drawing the menus I think and that is something that needs addressing in ProWesS itself rather than by using a faster CPU. This is the Microsoft approach. Difference may be whether anti-aliasing is turned on or not. This requires quite a bit of extra processing. Joachim
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 22/11/2002 7:31:14 ??, ?/? Joachim Van der Auwera [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: To use ProWess, you need speed . Yes but not that much. It ran fine on my Q40 (when the writeback cache was turned off that is) . On my laptop (800MHz celeron), BlaqBox (667MHz Via) and main PC (1.6GHz P4) it is a bit faster but I could use it OK on the Q 40. Most of the speed loss is in drawing the menus I think and that is something that needs addressing in ProWesS itself rather than by using a faster CPU. This is the Microsoft approach. Difference may be whether anti-aliasing is turned on or not. This requires quite a bit of extra processing. Joachim I haven't (yet) installed ProWesS on the Q40 (So many things, so little time...) but I was wondering if it uses any FPU code... ie will the FPU on the Q40 do anything to it? (Or will it need a recompile maybe?) Phoebus
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
I haven't (yet) installed ProWesS on the Q40 (So many things, so little time...) but I was wondering if it uses any FPU code... ie will the FPU on the Q40 do anything to it? (Or will it need a recompile maybe?) ProWesS uses integer (fixpoint) arithmetic only. At that time, floating point was just no option.
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
Hi Bill, Why not have both boxes ?? I have both a Q60 and QPC2 v3 (recently updated at the London Show), which just does to show you can have both systems running. OK, I am part of the firm making the Q60, but I do not see why, I can not support all the software writers and other hardware manufacturers, as you see I like the QL in what ever shape or form it takes. Derek
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 21/11/2002 8:36:59 ??, ?/? Tony Firshman [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: On Wed, 20 Nov 2002 at 21:15:12, Phoebus Dokos wrote: (ref: 05TO1TN2164XRWUFD65OM1ZZX07DZX.3ddc41b0@quantumcentral) ??? 20/11/2002 7:15:52 ??, ?/? Roy Wood [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: The mouse is a different kettle of herring. Keith Mitchel can make a PS/2 mouse work with a superHermes Lite but that is a direct wiring. Most converters just do not work. I am not sure what you meant exactly by that... If Keith has adapted a PS/2 only mouse directly on the superHermes I would like to talk to him to exchange designs (And Tony I would expect!) I know about this - it uses the 'spare' port and the 5v/gnd and I/O lines there. Well it won't work unless he gets a clock from somewhere (Unless he's using one of the I/O lines as a clock -but I doubt it is electrically compatible to begin with with that-) Phoebus
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
On Thu, 21 Nov 2002 at 09:42:09, Phoebus Dokos wrote: (ref: LKYTVUNMKI963X1Z96FBPLTNTQCBPLD0.3ddcf0c1@quantumcentral) Mitchel can make a PS/2 mouse work with a superHermes Lite but that is a direct wiring. Most converters just do not work. I am not sure what you meant exactly by that... If Keith has adapted a PS/2 only mouse directly on the superHermes I would like to talk to him to exchange designs (And Tony I would expect!) I know about this - it uses the 'spare' port and the 5v/gnd and I/O lines there. Well it won't work unless he gets a clock from somewhere (Unless he's using one of the I/O lines as a clock -but I doubt it is electrically compatible to begin with with that-) It should be - but it would be easy to fit an external oscillator as there is a spare line. I must look up the specs. Mind you the I/O line is TTL so surely that is OK if the clock can be software derived. Can it work asynchronously? -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 tony@surname.co.uk http://www.firshman.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
In message 76D9F06BB0F9D411B65500B0D079D90A15F3C7@NTSRV01, Claude Mourier 00 [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes To use ProWess, you need speed . Yes but not that much. It ran fine on my Q40 (when the writeback cache was turned off that is) . On my laptop (800MHz celeron), BlaqBox (667MHz Via) and main PC (1.6GHz P4) it is a bit faster but I could use it OK on the Q 40. Most of the speed loss is in drawing the menus I think and that is something that needs addressing in ProWesS itself rather than by using a faster CPU. This is the Microsoft approach. -- Roy Wood Q Branch, 20 Locks Hill Portslade. Sussex. BN41 2LB. UK Tel : +44 (0)1273 386030 Fax : +44 (0)1273 430501 (New number!) Mobile +44(0)7836 745501 Web : www.qbranch.demon.co.uk
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
Now... take a look at: http://www.motorola.com/mediacenter/news/detail/0,1958,1895_1555_23,00.html To see what V5 currently supports (First devices available in early 2003) Phoebus From this it is very difficult to understand if it would be capable to run existing 68000 code without modifications. Arnould
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 20/11/2002 3:28:44 ??, ?/? Arnould Nazarian [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: Now... take a look at: http://www.motorola.com/mediacenter/news/detail/0,1958,1895_1555_23,00.html To see what V5 currently supports (First devices available in early 2003) Phoebus From this it is very difficult to understand if it would be capable to run existing 68000 code without modifications. It's there somewhere trust me :-) Nonetheless there's always the 68K code module that motorola gives for free as well as PortAsm/68K As for complaints regarding JIT compilers... I don't see anybody complaining about M$'s IL code in the .NET platform (which could even run on a 68060 theoretically) :-) Phoebus
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 20/11/2002 7:15:52 ??, ?/? Roy Wood [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: The keyboard is fairly easy in that regard because all converters work in the same way. Exactly PS/2 keyboards don't need a signal converter... just a different connector. The mouse is a different kettle of herring. Keith Mitchel can make a PS/2 mouse work with a superHermes Lite but that is a direct wiring. Most converters just do not work. I am not sure what you meant exactly by that... If Keith has adapted a PS/2 only mouse directly on the superHermes I would like to talk to him to exchange designs (And Tony I would expect!) (I have too but the software is the most difficult part as the Keyboard Clock signal must be shared). If you mean wiring a Serial/PS/2 Combo mouse, that's really easy to do... all you need is an extra power line... usually get it from one of the spare ports of the superHermes... but you are using really the mouse in Serial not PS/2 mode.. Phoebus
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
HeHe If we are getting into this silly game how about X4 2.7Ghz Xeons. The point is that Intel and AMD are in a fight for the fastest processors, hence QL emulation speed, which Motorola is not taking part in directly. There is no evidence that this quest for greater speed is in anyway slowing down cheers Colin - Original Message - From: Phoebus Dokos [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, November 18, 2002 3:16 PM Subject: Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two ??? 18/11/2002 9:27:41 ??, ?/? Colin Parsons [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: What about a 3.1 Ghz PC Hehe, what about dual 1.2GHz PowerPC G4s? (Dave can give you figures there :-) Phoebus
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
If we're aiming that high, do we have Java RT (or better) on the wishlist? Might as well put X on there too... Steve Oliver From: Phoebus Dokos [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 2002/11/19 Tue AM 12:57:05 EST To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two ??? 18/11/2002 6:33:43 ??, ?/? Dave P [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: What makes the QL not relevant is that people are WILLIGN to pay an arm and a leg to get something that will use up the resources of a 3GHz machine. Scary! Yep and they end up losing the other two as well when they repeatedly bang them against the wall when the PeeCee hangs just at the moment they were backing the damn thing up :-) 800MHz coming, eh? Anyone up for writing DVD/video s/w for SMSQ? :o) 800 MHz or not Video playback of ANY kind won't be feasible (unless you have 1Gig of memory or so) until true background IOSS operation is possible (ie rationalization of the IO, metadrivers etc...) Phoebus --- Steve Oliver Oak Ridge TN
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 19/11/2002 10:35:14 ??, ?/? Steve Oliver [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: If we're aiming that high, do we have Java RT (or better) on the wishlist? Might as well put X on there too... Java isn't that unreasonable... I believe it already runs on Q60 (under Linux) but I can tell you that AFTER I finish installation of Q40 Linux :-) As for X... already running on QL style hardware :-) Phoebus Steve Oliver From: Phoebus Dokos [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 2002/11/19 Tue AM 12:57:05 EST To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two ??? 18/11/2002 6:33:43 ??, ?/? Dave P [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: What makes the QL not relevant is that people are WILLIGN to pay an arm and a leg to get something that will use up the resources of a 3GHz machine. Scary! Yep and they end up losing the other two as well when they repeatedly bang them against the wall when the PeeCee hangs just at the moment they were backing the damn thing up :-) 800MHz coming, eh? Anyone up for writing DVD/video s/w for SMSQ? :o) 800 MHz or not Video playback of ANY kind won't be feasible (unless you have 1Gig of memory or so) until true background IOSS operation is possible (ie rationalization of the IO, metadrivers etc...) Phoebus --- Steve Oliver Oak Ridge TN
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
Is there a lot of that? I'm not all that motivated to buy QL hardware to run Linux. I've no doubt it works, but I'm thinking about running a QL as a QL. Steve Oliver From: Phoebus Dokos [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: 2002/11/19 Tue PM 12:02:10 EST To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two ??? 19/11/2002 10:35:14 ??, ?/? Steve Oliver [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: If we're aiming that high, do we have Java RT (or better) on the wishlist? Might as well put X on there too... Java isn't that unreasonable... I believe it already runs on Q60 (under Linux) but I can tell you that AFTER I finish installation of Q40 Linux :-) As for X... already running on QL style hardware :-) Phoebus ... stuff removed ...
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 19/11/2002 6:22:56 ??, ?/? Roy Wood [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: In message KJ1XQPLGSRHDD0IG1XPO1XRPGCZ1XZU.3dd98f57@michelle, Phoebus [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes Hi Roy, You misunderstood Dave, he talked about AN ACTUAL Serial to PS/2 converter not a device dependent one... The one he mentions costs some money, not just pence\ As far as I know there is not one because the PS/2 devices all use different wiring. This may have settled down since I last looked into it but a company with a commercial rollerball project would love to know about it because they have been tearing out their hair trying to get a converter that works. Actually yes AND no... there are only two kinds of serial devices, once being the mouse and one the keyboard... these use practically the same lines but are raised high when the other one is raised low and vice-versa (That's why you can install a y-adapter for notebooks that can take external keyboards and mouse at the same time). What differs and probably confused you as it did me before Tony Firshman showed me the light ;-) was that there are Serial/PS/2 mice which carry ALL the standard PS/2 signals but can also switch to serial mode... almost everysingle one of them sends the signals in different ports though PS/2 keyboard is easier to implement as it's just a regular keyboard with a smaller connector ;-) (ie my Aurora and QL run with a PS/2 port - no external converters) Phoebus -- Roy Wood Q Branch, 20 Locks Hill Portslade. Sussex. BN41 2LB. UK Tel : +44 (0)1273 386030 Fax : +44 (0)1273 430501 (New number!) Mobile +44(0)7836 745501 Web : www.qbranch.demon.co.uk
RE: [ql-users] One box or two
Conclusion : it's sad Motorola never released fasters 68k processors. 80Mhz is 1/20 compared with 1,6Ghz. Claude -Message d'origine- De : Duncan Neithercut [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Envoyé : dimanche 17 novembre 2002 20:57 À : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Objet : RE: [ql-users] One box or two Hi, etc...
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
Hi, I think that the average user is not too worried about the fact that one system may be a bit faster than the other one on number crunching or Benchmarks. The daily work is not benchmark, it is usually a lot of everything, including I/O (I think that's what Roy said some time ago). Printing over the PAR device on a Q40 was very slow, for example. My old ATARI TT was printing at about 4 times the speed with the first SMSQ/E. After Tony Tebby and I spent quite some time on fiddling with the interrupt and generating them without the printer's help, we managed to speed up printing a bit - but it was still slower than on the ATARI TT. Peter Graf sent me a program which printed a file to the parallel port much faster, but this was then done in a loop and not through the device. That wasn't a real solution for me - a bit tedious not to be able to print to PAR, but to a file first and then have the file spooled to the port. I am a bit of a port maniac because I need several printers, but here is QPC more than helpful. Up to 8 serial ports, up to 4 parallel ports (or printers connected somewhere somehow, e.g. USB or LAN) give me the highest flexibility I can think of. Even if we manage to print to EPSON emulators or via postscript or whatever (I am refering to the printer language problem here), there is the problem that most modern printers only come with USB connectors. The more expensive models come with USB and PAR, but how long is this going to last? More and more printer models have the PAR connector removed. I/O is the key in many other aspects. Have you ever tried an optical mouse? If so, would ever want to go back to a ball mouse? I don't think so. Without a PS/2 connector or USB on the Qx0's it will be hard to find a mouse for the serial port in general, let alone a hi-tech mouse (although cordless and optical are fairly cheap nowadays). You all probably know that I was an ATARI fan for many, many years, and I like my TT very much. However, since technology moves on, and QPC got better and better, I somehow did not like to have to go back to the old stuff after I got used to the new, much better devices on my PC and QPC. And as I said: when Marcel introduced the very many IO ports this made my TT obsolete. I was worried about the USB etc. already years ago when I still favoured my TT, but there was no real solution. Nowadays, the situation is much more pro-USB. There are problems (driver problems, unknown device etc. and for the QL programmers USB must be a nightmare), but when the devices work they are great! And you really don't have a choice anyway. Don't get me wrong: I am not telling you that you should buy a PC because it's a PC to run Windows, no, I am trying to give you an idea how flexible QPC can be used on it - and what you have to consider in terms of I/O, connecting devices, monitors, flat screens, printers, mice, modems, and whatever. This should all go into your decision before you spend a lot of money on either product. Both have their advantages, both have their disadvantages, but talking about the speed only is quite misleading (and I don't know or don't care whether a Q60 is faster or slower than a state-of-the Art PC and which product is cheaper or more expensive ... just seeing a leaflet of a brandnew, ridiculously cheap ALDI PC here with virtually everything in it - NO, I am NOT tempted to buy it!) The main question should be: how are YOU going to use the system, what are you going to do with it and what do you want/plan to connect to it. Regards Jochen
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
On 18/11/02 at 14:27 Colin Parsons wrote: What about a 3.1 Ghz PC Considering that it would still just barely beat the Q60 I think you would be better off with a Q60 since the whole thing costs less than the 3.1GHz CPU alone - assuming you find one that will actually run at that speed. Nasta
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
In message [EMAIL PROTECTED], Tony Firshman [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes I/O is the key in many other aspects. Have you ever tried an optical mouse? If so, would ever want to go back to a ball mouse? I don't think so. Without a PS/2 connector or USB on the Qx0's it will be hard to find a mouse for the serial port in general, let alone a hi-tech mouse (although cordless and optical are fairly cheap nowadays). It should be possible to use a ps2 to serial converter. USB though is a major problem. The PS2 to Serial conversion cable or plug is very much tied to the object it is connecting to. You cannot use any converter with any device. They just don't work. -- Roy Wood Q Branch, 20 Locks Hill Portslade. Sussex. BN41 2LB. UK Tel : +44 (0)1273 386030 Fax : +44 (0)1273 430501 (New number!) Mobile +44(0)7836 745501 Web : www.qbranch.demon.co.uk
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
18/11/2002 6:49:29 ìì, Roy Wood [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In message [EMAIL PROTECTED], Tony Firshman [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes I/O is the key in many other aspects. Have you ever tried an optical mouse? If so, would ever want to go back to a ball mouse? I don't think so. Without a PS/2 connector or USB on the Qx0's it will be hard to find a mouse for the serial port in general, let alone a hi-tech mouse (although cordless and optical are fairly cheap nowadays). It should be possible to use a ps2 to serial converter. USB though is a major problem. The PS2 to Serial conversion cable or plug is very much tied to the object it is connecting to. You cannot use any converter with any device. They just don't work. Hi Roy, You misunderstood Dave, he talked about AN ACTUAL Serial to PS/2 converter not a device dependent one... The one he mentions costs some money, not just pence\ Phoebus
Re: RE: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 18/11/2002 6:33:43 ??, ?/? Dave P [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: What makes the QL not relevant is that people are WILLIGN to pay an arm and a leg to get something that will use up the resources of a 3GHz machine. Scary! Yep and they end up losing the other two as well when they repeatedly bang them against the wall when the PeeCee hangs just at the moment they were backing the damn thing up :-) 800MHz coming, eh? Anyone up for writing DVD/video s/w for SMSQ? :o) 800 MHz or not Video playback of ANY kind won't be feasible (unless you have 1Gig of memory or so) until true background IOSS operation is possible (ie rationalization of the IO, metadrivers etc...) Phoebus
Re: [ql-users] One box or two
??? 17/11/2002 1:24:05 ??, ?/? Marcel Kilgus [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: Bill Waugh wrote: 1. speed of Q60/60 in bogomips 2. speed of QPC2 v3 on a 1.8 gh celeron based PC in bogomips I probably would have stayed quiet on the subject (because of the famous wars), but as you asked for BogoMIPS values I need to write some lines: I don't have exact figure for either of the two, but I can tell you nonetheless that QPC will easily lose this contest (in a devastating way) because BogoMips has no real life meaning at all (and I don't mean the usual benchmarks don't tell you everything, I really mean it has NO meaning at all). The benchmark basically consist of 1 line: With a JIT compiler, QPC would probably win there easily for the reason Marcel said). It's best I think to get ahold of someone with a Q60, test it and then run the same (Dhrystone) tests on your QPC demo (You cannot write on the disk but you can run programs ;-) I don't think that there is any performance loss between the regular and the demo versions... Only YOU can test how QPC will fare on your machine :-) Just to show what this means: the Q40 has a BogoMIPS value of about 27. This means that the 68060/80 has an impressive 600% increase in speed while only having 100% more clock rate. If you however compare the Dhrystone (which is far from being perfect, but at least much better than BogoMIPS) results you get 36443 to 100603, i.e. 276% more, which is much more realistic (tasks involving hardware like graphics will BTW usually gain less). Don't forget that the 68060 is a superscalar processor, so processing percentages are quite higher... From the m68k FAQ: MC68060: This is the latest and most powerful member of the 68K family. The '060 is designed as an upgrade from a '040 with 2.5 to 3.5 times the performance of the 25 mhz '040. It uses Superscalar pipelined architecture which means it can perform more than one instruction at a time. The 68060 allows simultaneous execution of two integer instructions (or 1 integer and 1 float instruction) and one branch during each clock cycle. A branch cache allows most branches to execute in zero cycles. The '060 offers 100 MIPS @ 66mhz and 250 million operations per second @ 50 mhz. SPECint = 50 @ 50Mhz. OK, one might ask, then how do they compete in real life. In that case I must say this depends on how you define real life. I have no doubt that the 68060/60 will beat the mentioned QPC/Celeron combination in pure integer number crunching any time, any place (only the most recent PCs come within the range of close competition). On the other hand I'm sure it will lose when there's a lot of QDOS floating point arithmetic to do (SBASIC programs), in matters of I/O (WIN, PAR) or certain basic high colour graphics tasks (e.g. draw a block or move a rectangle, very important for the PE). With FPUFNs performance increases dramatically. Even on the Q40 it's there to be seen... In complex math-oriented operations (that I am doing at least;-) like absolute pixel based circles, fills and screen effects (all of the above use floating point arithmetic) and school work (Time Series analysis, ANOVA tables, coefficient correlations on data sets where again floating point arithmetic is needed 99,99% of the time) the performance increase is dramatic with FPUFNs... The FPUFNs117.zip readme file isn't joking... in some categories performance enhancement of 800% over the regular 68EC040 (measurable on the QXL too as I do have a full 68040 there as well) is realistic (SOME categories not all.. overall average performance boost from regular QDOS functions to FPU enhanced functions is about 300% (and that's only on the regular Q40). Now on the Q60 I can only guess... Marcel is indeed right about the cache and BogoMips and he is also right to tell you that the best benchmark should be Dhrystone21 (From Thierry, get the gcc Compiled version). I really cannot tell how it feels on disk access, but given the fact that Marcel has heavily optimised the code and that PC drive access is extremely fast nowadays... QPC must easily outperform the Qx0 there. A great bonus is the DOS device that the Qx0 doesn't have... -However DOS formatted drives can be read by Qx0 Linux- The PAR device is a lot better on the QPC as well, as for the graphics I really cannot tell. I am very satisfied with the Q40 (once the FPU is turned on) but under normal operation QPC is a lot faster on the screen (the 128bit graphics engines on modern cards are very helpful you see :-) Of course. I'd just not rely on BogoMIPS. There's a reason some people advertise with it ;-) I'd suggest Dhrystone, QSBB (on identical SMSQ/E versions) and Test909 (the latter two being especially good if the main use for the machine is SBASIC). Marcel is absolutely right here as well (see also above) I used to be indecisive but now I'm not so sure, Even more confused now? In that case it's the best to get both ;-) Yes :-) Sell some old
