Old workstations that were purposely designed to run proprietary UNIX(r) were also, coincidentally, super-proprietary.
If you could install IRIX on junk commodity hardware no one would have a reason to pay SGI $100k for one of theirs.
If you could install IRIX on junk commodity hardware no one would have a reason to pay SGI $100k for one of theirs.
They worked very hard to make IRIX a competitive advantage over other UNIX vendors, but it was never a reason to buy SGI over "commodity"
If anything, IRIX was a hindrance to adoption, because UNIX was notoriously RAM-hungry, and the early 1990s had a horrible, horrible price crunch on RAM.
I remember this, because around that time I got my first PC(not my first computer), which was a 25Mhz 486. For 5000.- Deutsche Mark. At that time such systems from IBM, Compaq and so on sold for 15.000.- Deutsche Mark.
My system lacked the cache RAMs for the L2, and the tag RAM for these, though I could, and did plug these in afterwards, for actually not that much money(about 80 Deutschmarks).
It also had a slow and small PATA disk, on a mediocre mainboard. Just 80MB. The VGA screen I initially got with it was also mediocre at best, as was the ISA VGA in a VESA Local Bus system...
For the 15.000 of whicheveruniversalcreditunits at the time, vs. just 5000 of them, you'd gotten a more balanced system from IBM, Compaq, etc., with larger and faster disk(s), more RAM, working L2-cache, maybe even SCSI, better graphics, probably better screen, keyboard & mouse.
Now the Fuel, of the final MIPS generation, was hot garbage. Early-2000s PC crap plus SGI does not equal awesome. Fast, but flaky, stuttery, and with too many graphical artifacts for the price. Maybe the V12 was better than the V10. I don't care to find out.