I cut my teeth on RISC/OS (MIPS Unix) in the 80’s, found my steam as a systems software developer, administrator, proponent of SGI, using and coding for it for decades .. until the fateful day they stopped being a hardware company. I switched to the tiBook. From Apple, the one company I never expected to release a ‘decent Unix workstation’.
How sad it was to see SGI perish.
I seriously lusted after an SGI laptop in that era. (I think Apple stole the show, though.)
The few prototypes of an SGI laptop I saw in Hollywood backlots were enough of a clue, at least to me at the time, it was serious: Unix Workstations had to leave the desktop and become ‘a thing’. Sure thing: I still have my personal O2, and a collection of old Indy/MIPS tape dumps to go with it, and I am still in awe of what could have been if SGI had only done the one thing that would have saved their asses and made a consumer laptop. My, how I pine for that machine. Hey .. thats history now.
Anyway .. SGI workstations are wonderful playgrounds of creative code. The Pipeline CD’s, the Developer Toolbox series, these were always a welcome read or so when they arrived .. lots of neat demo’s, often some insightful articles here and there, oh yeah .. of course, the Netscape binaries, other great tools that sometimes took a bit of cajoling and cavorting, but you could often tweak out the workstation with lots of fun toys. ElectroGIG 3DGO demo’s (the Blender of its time), the wonderful and immensely envy-inducing Tranquility universe, and .. well .. I remember bumping into the ‘fsn’ tool on one of these CD’s. A cute little hack that ‘did something’ with the engine, when it wasn’t chundering Maya/3DGo/&etc.. (I wish I still had a stack of those old CD’s for the box, alas it sits quiet, awaiting the next yearly power-up, in its crypt..)
Was therefore disappointing to see ‘fsn’ being used as a prop in a movie a little while later, but not surprising given that SGI workstations were all over Hollywood at the time.
I really think it’d be neat for SGI to get a reboot. An SGI laptop to go up against Apple .. this would be a feat indeed, and quite viable IMHO. Of course, I mean the SGI “ethos and mystique” of the era, as it was, rebooted into the modern era, not the humble shell that is left behind the current name as it exists today. If only they’d made that laptop. If Hollywood can reboot, why can’t we ..
There was nothing SGI could have done to survive – their entire business was predicated on oversupplying GPU power to budget-constrained purchasing departments. As soon as decent commodity GPU hardware was available, they were dogmeat. It’s a shame, because I loved my SGIs, but why pay $40k for marginal graphics performance you’ll never use, if a $5k Windows NT machine can do the same thing?
Sure, they could have done something: made an SGI Indy laptop and promoted their developer culture a lot more. But on the other hand, the company wasn’t set up to do a consumer-level play, like Apple was.
Their hardware chops were not only about 3D graphics and big math. They could also design a lot of other things that would’ve made the grade. The Indy was on its way to becoming a laptop with power .. and don’t forget, SGI was a significant player in the Games Industry too. A little consumer push, maybe a little less incest, and maybe SGI could’ve made a gaming laptop that also happened to be a Unix workstation ..
Hey, its just fun to play - I know the reality. The reality is I type this on my 5th or 6th Macbook.
I don’t think this is realistic. Keep in mind that the Indy was dreadfully slow and absurdly overpriced. Now, how exactly could SGI have produced a consumer anything, given the millstone that was MIPS? Hey, I wanted one of those portables at the time, but even the dire Powerbook 540c would’ve kicked sand in the face of anything SGI could’ve reasonably bought to market for 4x the money.
fsvis an open source equivalent that runs on your modern Unix of choice.has anyone got it running on OSX yet? :)
I cut my teeth on RISC/OS (MIPS Unix) in the 80’s, found my steam as a systems software developer, administrator, proponent of SGI, using and coding for it for decades .. until the fateful day they stopped being a hardware company. I switched to the tiBook. From Apple, the one company I never expected to release a ‘decent Unix workstation’.
How sad it was to see SGI perish.
I seriously lusted after an SGI laptop in that era. (I think Apple stole the show, though.)
The few prototypes of an SGI laptop I saw in Hollywood backlots were enough of a clue, at least to me at the time, it was serious: Unix Workstations had to leave the desktop and become ‘a thing’. Sure thing: I still have my personal O2, and a collection of old Indy/MIPS tape dumps to go with it, and I am still in awe of what could have been if SGI had only done the one thing that would have saved their asses and made a consumer laptop. My, how I pine for that machine. Hey .. thats history now.
Anyway .. SGI workstations are wonderful playgrounds of creative code. The Pipeline CD’s, the Developer Toolbox series, these were always a welcome read or so when they arrived .. lots of neat demo’s, often some insightful articles here and there, oh yeah .. of course, the Netscape binaries, other great tools that sometimes took a bit of cajoling and cavorting, but you could often tweak out the workstation with lots of fun toys. ElectroGIG 3DGO demo’s (the Blender of its time), the wonderful and immensely envy-inducing Tranquility universe, and .. well .. I remember bumping into the ‘fsn’ tool on one of these CD’s. A cute little hack that ‘did something’ with the engine, when it wasn’t chundering Maya/3DGo/&etc.. (I wish I still had a stack of those old CD’s for the box, alas it sits quiet, awaiting the next yearly power-up, in its crypt..)
Was therefore disappointing to see ‘fsn’ being used as a prop in a movie a little while later, but not surprising given that SGI workstations were all over Hollywood at the time.
I really think it’d be neat for SGI to get a reboot. An SGI laptop to go up against Apple .. this would be a feat indeed, and quite viable IMHO. Of course, I mean the SGI “ethos and mystique” of the era, as it was, rebooted into the modern era, not the humble shell that is left behind the current name as it exists today. If only they’d made that laptop. If Hollywood can reboot, why can’t we ..
There was nothing SGI could have done to survive – their entire business was predicated on oversupplying GPU power to budget-constrained purchasing departments. As soon as decent commodity GPU hardware was available, they were dogmeat. It’s a shame, because I loved my SGIs, but why pay $40k for marginal graphics performance you’ll never use, if a $5k Windows NT machine can do the same thing?
Sure, they could have done something: made an SGI Indy laptop and promoted their developer culture a lot more. But on the other hand, the company wasn’t set up to do a consumer-level play, like Apple was.
Their hardware chops were not only about 3D graphics and big math. They could also design a lot of other things that would’ve made the grade. The Indy was on its way to becoming a laptop with power .. and don’t forget, SGI was a significant player in the Games Industry too. A little consumer push, maybe a little less incest, and maybe SGI could’ve made a gaming laptop that also happened to be a Unix workstation ..
Hey, its just fun to play - I know the reality. The reality is I type this on my 5th or 6th Macbook.
I don’t think this is realistic. Keep in mind that the Indy was dreadfully slow and absurdly overpriced. Now, how exactly could SGI have produced a consumer anything, given the millstone that was MIPS? Hey, I wanted one of those portables at the time, but even the dire Powerbook 540c would’ve kicked sand in the face of anything SGI could’ve reasonably bought to market for 4x the money.
I remember being wowed by FSN when it first came out in around 1992. It looked like the future. Not so much any more.