XDE, the Mesa development environment was run on the same hardware as Star. Star’s biggest issue was that it had far too little real memory and was always thras

XDE, the Mesa development environment was run on the same hardware as Star. Star’s biggest issue was that it had far too little real memory and was always thrashing. XDE did much better than Star on a small memory footprint and did not feel slow and generally did not get into a thrashing state. The issue was not the language or the OS, Star and XDE ran on the same Pilot OS, but the architecture of the Star software and the amount or simultaneous this it did in its integrated application which increased its memory foot print. You are perhaps confusing Cedar rather than Mesa which normally ran on the larger machines. The other machines you mention were far too large and noisy to use in an office or normal work environment. NO ONE for example had a Dorado in their office, it was always in another room.