[25] in 1993-clients
Video issues.
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bill Cattey)
Tue Mar 10 19:17:31 1992
Date: Tue, 10 Mar 1992 19:17:06 -0500 (EST)
From: Bill Cattey <wdc@Athena.MIT.EDU>
To: 1993-clients@Athena.MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <9203101528.AA23900@Toto.MIT.EDU>
After posting my review to 1993-clients, I had a chat with Jon, and now
I have a reply from Mark Rosenstein raising thought provoking issues in
video tradeoffs:
> You say that you don't like the color heads we have. But given the
> choice of that 16" color or 17" monochrome, what would you choose? How
> about given the choice of replacing ALL of the VS2000's with 16" color
> screens, or only being able to replace 2/3 of them with new machines
> having 19" monitors? We know that people aren't entirely happy with the
> display heads. But there's a real cost/performance tradeoff, and we're
> trying to decide which way to go.
I'd choose 17 inch grey-scale. Because it offers the following more
ideal balance:
1. More pixels on the screen. (1280x1024 instead of 1024x768)
2. Upgrade to a variety of color displays is possible at modest
incremental cost.
3. Benefits to the Library project.
4. Perceived useful display area is MUCH greater!
Let me go into detail:
Many vendors, Sun included, sell a small-screen color configuration for
less than their big-screen monochrome.
Color displays require more dots per inch and more inches to display the
same number of characters that a grey scale or monochrome display. This
means that the DEC 5000/25 is doubly reduced in video: 16 inches of
screen instead of 19 inches, and 1000x768 instead of the current
emerging standard of 1280x1024.
The Library project is looking into offering bit-images of journals,
first throught the Tulip pilot project, and later as a regular service
designed into Dr. Saltzer's Library 2000 system. The best display
medium for these texts would be grey-scale displays. Having a
non-trivial number of grey-scale workstations around campus, or perhaps
in a particular cluster would be VERY beneficial to study of this
bit-image service. (The relevant issue is that grey-scale monitors can
offer anti-aliased fonts which enable a 72 or 100 dpi screen to present
as readible a page as a 300 dpi monochrome laser printer.)
There ARE configurations of the DEC 5000 that can be purchased with
grey-scale monitors and later upgraded to color at modest incremental
cost.
Part of the reason why the DEC 5000/25 is in the price class it is,
comes from its pathological inability to be expanded at modest cost.
Going to more pixels on the screen requires a new display board. Am I
correct in thinking that DEC won't sell larger screens for the DEC
5000/25?
If it comes down to a choice of not being able to replace all our 1 mips
machines, then maybe we must opt for the unpleasant video of the DEC
5000/25.
But if there is any slack at all, then I would feel much better with
higher resolution and grey scale at the present time.
-wdc
