9fans archive / 1998 / 09 / 87 /    prev next

From: James A. Robinson Jim.Robinson@Sta...
Subject: [9fans] Building a new Plan 9 system.
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 00:38:38 -0700

Hey all,


I've been reading Plan 9 documents for the past month or so. Plan 9 seems
like the ideal system to explore distributed operating systems that are
well thought out.  I've also been looking at Beowulf, since I have been
running Linux since 1992, but it just doesn't seem to have the elegant
nature of Plan 9.

Two years ago, I went through much the same thing -- I read the papers,
and was very impressed. I wanted a system to play around on! Since I was a
student at the time, it was not to be -- I just didn't have the resources.
Now that I'm in the work force, that has changed, and I want to go ahead
and build a nice system.

I'm setting up a spec sheet for a complete setup (File server, CPU server,
and one terminal). In regards to the terminal, I'm having trouble figuring
out what I video cards a) I can still get ahold of, and b) will work well.
Is there a high resolution video card which is still being made and sold
that people would recommend for plan9? I would like to eventually make
drivers for my current video cards (I've got one Matrox Millenium, two
Matrox Millentium II, and one #9 Revolution 3D), but in the mean time I
need a card.  Ideally I would like to have 1600x1200, or 1280x1024, in as
many colors as plan9 needs for normal use.  I've got my current linux box
running at 1600x1200x24 and would love it if I could get the same with
plan9. The number of colors isn't THAT important to me, since most of
what I do is text based, but I would like at least 256 colors if possible.

In case the answer is "out of luck, pal -- no such beast," I've
combed through the 9fans archive, and whatever FAQs I could locate
(plan9.bell-labs.com "what we use" and the Toronto "supported hardware"
list).  I've come up with vendors that claim to sell the following cards:

	#9 9fx Motion 771 PCI ($194.00) Diamond Stealth64 Graphics 2001
	($60.00) Ultimate TrueColor XLp/PCI ET4000/W32 ($92.00) S3 Trio
	64 V+2MB ($30.00)

What would people recommend?  What do you use?	If people e-mail me
directly, I can post a summary at the end of the week (if people want
one).


Jim