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Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.development.system,comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mira.net.au!yarrina.connect.com.au!news.mel.connect.com.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.ecn.uoknor.edu!qns3.qns.com!imci4!newsfeed.internetmci.com!uwm.edu!news.inap.net!news1!not-for-mail From: root@dyson.iquest.net (Charlie Root) Subject: Re: Why to not buy Matrox Millennium X-Nntp-Posting-Host: dyson.iquest.net Message-ID: <4k5e42$3he@dyson.iquest.net> Sender: news@iquest.net (News Admin) Organization: John S. Dyson's Machine References: <4jn4qp$6p@darkstar.my.lan> <4jve3t$cfe@hermes.synopsys.com> <4k0m0f$68j@hoopoe.psc.edu> <4k2i4g$n55@usenet.srv.cis.pitt.edu> Date: Sat, 6 Apr 1996 09:39:14 GMT Lines: 47 Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.development.system:20993 comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc:513 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:3082 comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc:2861 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:16995 In article <4k2i4g$n55@usenet.srv.cis.pitt.edu>, Mark Hahn <hahn@neurocog.lrdc.pitt.edu> wrote: > >> These results were published at the January 1996 USENIX technical conference, >> in a paper by Kevin Lai and Mary Baker from Stanford. I'm sure this >> paper is available on the web -- I apologize for not having a URL, but >> I'm looking at the hard copy now. The bottom line is that Linux CPU >> performance is better than FreeBSD's (not surprising, since Linux >> is so intel-specific) but it's networking performance is, to put it >> most kindly, a joke. > >this is asinine foolishness; BSD bigotry like this is usually found >in a matrix of Sun true-believerhood, and then only in CIS/MIS groups. > Mark, Can you believe that *BSD has not stood still??? FreeBSD has made MAJOR performance improvements since -stable (and -stable is running on a 800-1000 user ftp server.) I have run lmbench on my system comparing FreeBSD vs. Linux for competitive analysis... Did you know that FreeBSD sometimes runs Linux binaries quicker than Linux? Sure, there are some areas where Linux has been significantly faster, but AFAIK FreeBSD has been (and is running) in situations that Linux just hasn't yet. The only problem with these somewhat silly p*ssing contests, is that everyone reading knows that almost everyone posting has some kind of agenda. I run FreeBSD/NetBSD/Linux (it is only responsible to, considering my involvement in FreeBSD). When there are some problems with FreeBSD, I know about them very quickly. One interesting note about benchmarks like lmbench, iozone, bonnie, and others is that the repeat the same operations over and over again. This significantly skews results. Sometimes you will find that FreeBSD will run slightly slower than other OSes, but usually those results come from tradeoffs that we have made to actually improve performance in real situations. For example, some of the regression tests that I use model processes with statistical behavior. None of the above tests (except the seek benchmark for bonnie) test system behavior under sort-of real conditions. (How many times do you copy a 100MB file sequentially, and not do it during a test run of bonnie?) Note though, I like the benchmarks that I mentioned above -- it is just that they show only a very small part of system behavior. John dyson@freebsd.org