Sun still sells SPARC workstations that run Solaris for around $2500. I think they would qualify as PCs.
I used Sparcstations for a few years. They were like PCs in a generic way but didn’t use x86 processors.
They didn’t have Microsoft Windows, they had SunView or a version of XWindows. X is common enough that some PC programs, like the finite element mesher Gambit, run under an XWindows server like Hummingbird Exceed on the PC.
Hi, I’m a long time reader, first time poster.
Indeed, there are now Iyonix PCs (www.iyonix.com) which are the successor to Acorn’s
RISC PC and Archimedes range (Acorn Archimedes - Wikipedia).
By some standards the software and hardware might be considered primitive, but I
find the simplicity and reliability of the machine to be a welcome change. I think there
are very few people who have a RISC OS box, who don’t have a Windows/Linux/Mac
machine for all the stuff which doesn’t work* under RISC OS.
- Usually caused by companies who don’t know about, or choose to ignore, the relatively
small number of RISC OS users.
For me, having an Iyonix is a luxury, but at the same time it’s a way of supporting a “local”
i.e. British technology. Desktop RISC OS is always going to be a hobbyist thing, and for
what I need it to do that’s fine.
Assuming this post appears properly, then Netsurf on my Iyonix is working fine.
Alex.
Netsurf seems OK, but every time I used it, it drove me nuts. My FIL is a big RISC OS fan - doesn’t do much for me. He had an RISC PC with ARM and 486 processors - Windows and RISC OS in the same box. That was fairly cool for the time.
I like the Iyonix though - just a bit pricey for a Linux system 
There are alternative platforms to the Intel, but they are not commodity items, and are thus expensive. And the price/performance war between Intel and AMD is great for customers, and just contributes to the PC hardware dominance.
Si
Si
Interesting - I’d quite like to get hold of one of those Iyonix machines just to have a play with it, but they seem expensive - and the screenshots of the OS aren’t exactly selling it - it looks like Windows 3.1 or OS/2 Warp. I know appearance isn’t everything, but the description, the FAQ and everything else on their site just feel like they’re stuck a decade or two behind the market, and in some cases, not very interested in catching up - a couple of the answers in the FAQ are saying “no, it can’t do that” in a rather “That’s rubbish - why would you want to do that?” sort of way.
Still, it’s an interesting project just because it’s different.
Mine has a SPARC and runs Solaris using the CDE (Common Desktop Environment). It’s pretty archaic in look-and-feel, but does the job. It’s brand new this year, and was brought in to replace a three year old machine. It’s loud and whenever I turn it off the IT people come by asking me why they can’t back it up any more.
What about that $100 laptop?
There are some “handheld” computers that run on non-x86 CPUs, like the HTC Advantage. I’m not sure you can call them PCs though, since they are designed to supplement the PC, not replace it.
Now known as the OLPC XO-1, maybe because they couldn’t get the price quite that low… Anyway the XO-1 uses the AMD Geode processor, which is x86 architecture.
Just for the record xscale is an ARM instruction set processor.
I’m not sure what you mean by patented here, but Sparcs are open - both in that the definition of the ISA is published, and the UltraSparc T1 Verilog source code is available for free. You can’t get more open than that.
Besides the Sparc desktops, there is a cool machine called a SunRay which is a think client, and very cheap ($249.) Not quite the traditional PC, but when you use one you can go anywhere in your company and still get your session.
Holy crap, UltraSparc T1 and T2 are GPL’d?? That’s crazy, why didn’t I know that. These are state-of-the-art, highly innovative, big-budget chips. And there’s an xcale-based desktop that runs something called risc os? wow… just when you think you’ve heard it all.
On a related (more important?) note, there is renewed interest in developing alternate operating systems for PCs. There’s open source ReactOS which tries to clone windows xp and be compatible with its drivers and programs. And there’s closed source SkyOS, which is trying to push some new UI innovations among other things. Both are in beta, however. Linux too is gaining strength, as its gui engines (in particular GNOME) have finally gotten the sheen and polish that desktop users have always demanded. All this is further aided by MS totally dropping the ball with Vista (and apparently having no short-term plan to pick it back up). MacOS too, of course, is well in the race.
So while PC processors have converged on x86, what really counts, the OS architectures, are actually not as dead as might appear.
Were risc architectures abandoned because there was no technical advantage over x86 cisc architectures or was there an economic disadvantage? I have heard that post-486 architectures are really risc machines with a bag on the side to translate 486 machine language. I have also heard that the reason that Apple abandoned the PowerPC was that IBM couldn’t sufficiently reduce G5 power consumption for laptop use. Are there still advantages to risc architectures over cisc?
Thanks,
Rob