Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
From: jbh@moses.oau.org (James B. Huber)
Subject: Re: Just An Observation
Organization: Genesis Controls, Inc.
Date: 26 Dec 1994 14:12:50 GMT
Message-ID: <JBH.94Dec26091251@moses.oau.org>

>>>>> ":" == ifunltd  <ifunltd@xs1.xs4all.nl> writes:

:> Well, it's the same reason the Transputer did not really take off in Europe
:> either: people just did not trust a European company - let alone a small
:> startup producer of miroprocessors - to make something good. After a few
:> years of looking at T's from a safe distance, the Americans decided the
:> i860 was a lot faster - and showed by this observation that they had not
:> understood the concept of distributed-memory parallel machines. 

:> Today, allmost everyone has understood that concept (look at all the big
:> producers and the architectures of their machines) and Inmos has practically
:> died. Tragic, but true: Americans are too much "patriots" to buy European,
:> and Europeans are too uncertain about their own potential to buy European.
:> If I would have a great idea for processors or machines, I would set up
:> an American company to sell it, for psychological reasons.

  I hate to quote all the above, but there is relevence in it to the
thread as a whole. I have to disagree withe all of the 'reasons' you
have outlined, I do not dispute the statements, just that I do not
believe these are the reasons the transputers have not caught on.

  First, we (the company I worked for) picked up on transputers
when they first became available. We were designing a new generation
of CNC controllers and they seemed like the ideal solution to
solving the scalability problems we had seen. Great, we investigated,
spent great amounts of time/effort and money to prove the conecpts
and create new designs etc. In the end the out end users would not
buy in for 2 reasons. The first was the chip was single sourced from
a company that was not entirely stable, the second....the price
performance curve stuck compared to other 'micro' processors that
were available. None of this was a lack of understanding of the
concepts, or disbelief that a good thing could be made by a
European company.

  Second, nobody believed that Inmos could or would continue the
onward development of the Transputer line. Within 18 months of it's
introduction it was obvious the Transputer was seriously behind
the curve on the price/performance ratio. To further insult the
world, Inmos wasn't willing to price the chip reasonably. We
discussed this with them directly. Perhaps they didn't have the
resources to get yields up enough to reduce costs ???? The 386
and 486 chips (YUK) were making the 'puter look *old* (performance
wise), and all Inmos had was empty words about a NEXT generation
of 'puters....Well 6 years later the next generation still isn't 
here...gee I guess all the nay sayers were right....

  Third, Inmos had the attitude (when they first started) that they
had created this great chip, and if you wanted the privilage of
using it, you were going to use OCCAM and their tools. Sorry
but that was plain crap. I don't care if you like occam or not,
they limited the accecptance right there. They also killed 3rd
party support for quite a while, further limiting the chips
chances of sucess. In a nutshell, they did just about everything
wrong that you could have done, their attitude stunk and people
stayed away....by the millions they stayed away.

  The concepts of the transputer were and are great. I believe
the chips did not gain wide accecptance for the reasons I have
outlined above. Gee, it would be great to have a real 9000 that
really met the specs they said it would (6+ years ago), it would
be great to be able to buy an 805 for $35.00 (US), because I can
get more Intel processing power for that same price I can't pay
more for a 'puter.

  In my world, the model a Transputer presents is ideal. But
the pricing etc. make it impossible for me to use...Such is
life, a better mouse-trap, when sold by a company who doesn't
know what to do with it, is useless.

Jim
-- 
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James B. Huber   jbh@moses.oau.org        (Work)  Voice (407) 662-7468
Genesis Controls, Inc.                    (Home)  Voice (407) 679-2270
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