> Flownet was a long way from "orders of magnitude" (factors of 10) better.
That article was written towards the end of FlowNet, when we were already winding it down. The work started in 1990. We built our first (and only) prototypes in 1992 (self-funded). Fast Ethernet was not introduced until 1995, and at that point our BOM cost was 20 times lower because our NICs used 100% off-the-shelf commodity hardware, and we didn't need hubs or switches. So for about a year we were 5x faster and 20x cheaper. It took five years for Fast Ethernet to completely catch up with us.
And remind me to tell you the story of Tokutek some time.
You illustrated an old, back of the envelope standard for investing in new hardware: The new stuff has to be at least 10 times better than the old stuff.
That article was written towards the end of FlowNet, when we were already winding it down. The work started in 1990. We built our first (and only) prototypes in 1992 (self-funded). Fast Ethernet was not introduced until 1995, and at that point our BOM cost was 20 times lower because our NICs used 100% off-the-shelf commodity hardware, and we didn't need hubs or switches. So for about a year we were 5x faster and 20x cheaper. It took five years for Fast Ethernet to completely catch up with us.
And remind me to tell you the story of Tokutek some time.