no, this is all nonsense. really, did any consumer buy an SGI workstation? or a Sun?
i mean, i used both at the time, but they were bought for me at ludicrous prices by the companies i worked/consulted for.
windows 2k was something you could buy that ran on consumer grade hardware, and was bloody good. it morphed into xp, which is my point about which came first.
> no, this is all nonsense. really, did any consumer buy an SGI workstation? or a Sun?
Yes. I had plenty of friends who did. Mostly from, very likely, similar companies like the ones you worked / consulted for when they upgraded. It turns out that despite the ludicrous prices new, last-generation workstations sold for a song, or were often just found in trash piles.
Corporate workstation markets aren't big into buying used. Supply and demand.
At the time, the gap between a modern Wintel and a previous-generation DEC Alpha (for compute) or IRIX (for 3D) was quite large, and not in Intel's favor. X + twm or similar was much more snappy than either NT or XP. And you had the full power of Unix.
Also: Multihead. Optical mice. Etc.
I had one particular a friend -- a student without more income than you'd expect of a student -- who had a whole roomful of older Suns, and probably a few Vaxes (which everyone hated).
i mean, i used both at the time, but they were bought for me at ludicrous prices by the companies i worked/consulted for.
windows 2k was something you could buy that ran on consumer grade hardware, and was bloody good. it morphed into xp, which is my point about which came first.