Well, I got a pretty good idea about this system from Subir Grewal.
It really looks like what I need for my purposes.
Thanks a lot!!
Matthias
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 19:12:22 -0700 (PDT)
From: Subir Grewal <subir_at_crl.com>
To: Matthias Nolte <nolte_at_bill.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: What is a VX40A-F2 desktop box?
I have a VX42A-Fs. DEC will not let you run Digital Unix on it (though
people have successfully installed and run Digital Unix on those boxes).
It will run AXPLinux and run it very well. From what people tell me, this
machine is super fast at doing floating point cals, and other stuff
(general Alpha story) but performance is not as good for other things. I
really haven't worked on mine since I've been busy playing with other
boxes I have, I have yet to install Linux. The box comes with WinNT (DEC
tried to market them as NT stations).
The VX40A-F2 has a 166Mhz chip $550
The VX42A-F2 has a 233Mhz chip $700
Those are prices I've seen on various newsgroups and at various resellers.
I paid $740 for mine. You'll have to get a keyboard and a monitor (needs
to be 72Mhz I think). The VX42 can be over-clocked to 266 Mhz. The chips
are 21066a and there's a ~500 meg drive. Config details can be found at:
http://www.damicon.fi/alpha/udb-233.html
A _much_ better option would be to consider buying some AlphaStation 200s
from Nekotech. We're considering these right now as well, for various
applications. They come with a two user Digital Unix license (which is a
give away practically). These are discontinued as well, but they're far
above the Multia/UDB (which is a very elegant machine, but not an
AlphaStation).
AS200 4/100 at 166Mhz $999
AS200 4/166 at 166Mhz $1759
Clock speed is lower, but don't let that fool you, a real AlphaStation is
much more reliable, and they have real 21064 chip which people who know
chips tell me make full use of the alpha's prowess. They also have 1 gig
drives and 32 megs of memory (the UDBs have 24) which you'll want raised
to 64 if you're doing any significant calculations (the alpha is a memory
hungry CPU).
On Thu, 10 Apr 1997, Matthias Nolte wrote:
:
:Hi folks,
:
:I have seen an ad for a "DEC The Universal Desktop Box (VX40A-F2)"
:with:
:
:CPU: 166 Mhz DEC Alpha 21066A with 16K internal cache - 166 MHz clock rate
:Secondary Cache: 256KB write-back
:TGA Video w/2 MB VRAM Graphics accelerator with VGA connector
:etc.
:
:Does anybody know where it fits into the DEC product line?
:It is an outdated system, I know, but we need a couple of extra low cost
:workstations.
:What kind of memory does it need? Is it somewhat similar to the AXP line
:which DEC had a while ago?? Could it be used for some semi serious
:calculations?
:
:
:Thanks a lot,
:
: Matthias
:
:email: nolte_at_bill.harvard.edu
:
Received on Thu Apr 17 1997 - 17:34:22 NZST