LispOS on a 68000

[Mike McDonald]

>From lispos-request@math.gatech.edu  Fri May 15 11:46:42 1998
>Resent-Date: Fri, 15 May 1998 14:17:23 -0400 (EDT)
>Date: Fri, 15 May 1998 13:18:15 -0500
>From: David Tillman <dtillman@cannonexpress.com>
>To: lispos@math.gatech.edu
>Subject: Re: LispOS on a 68000
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>
>
>    I am curious, how did the old LispMs relate to the 68000, 68030,
>    and 68040 speed wise?
>
>    What type of processor, architecture, and amount of memory/storage?
>
>    -Dave
>

  The old LispM had specially designed processors that had support for
operations that would be encountered in Lisp. It had support for
stacks, GC, things like that. (There used to be some online docs about
the architecture at the On-Line Symbolics Museum but the URL I have
for it doesn't work anymore. :-() I'd guess off hand that the raw
speed of the machine would be in the same general catagory as some of
the older 68Ks. As for memory, my loaded XL1201 has 6MW of memory in
it. The 3620s we used to use on a daily basis had 2 or 3MW in
them. Typical disk in the desktop versions was 180-360MB. Our 3600
file server had 450MB in it. So by today's standard, they were pretty
pathetic. But oh what they could do with what they had! This type of
machine is an excellant example of "It's not how much you have, it how
you use it."

  Mike McDonald
  mikemac@mikemac.com