#Networking Solutions
5 messages in this thread
Does anyone know of any inter-Amiga networking solutions other than the
Ameristar board? We're looking for a speed of over 50 Kbytes/sec average,
and will be interconnecting as many as 32 Amigas concurrently. I'd be
interested in hearing about any solution, even those somewhat slower than
what we require.
Ariel, just curious, but what will you be using the 32 Amigas for?
— Ethan
Ethan:
I really can't be too specific about what we're using these for. One of the
unfortunate effects of the "toy" stigma that's been applied to all CBM products
is that VAR's are loathe to advertise what their systems contain. They're not
ashamed, but basically cannot afford to lose money to various anal-retentive
types who break into palpitations when confronted with mega-buck deals. You
can, of course, deduce from this what I think about the "reality" of this
situation.
Suffice to say that the Amigas are being used for exactly what they're best at
(and some things they aren't best at) in a system aimed at the financial
market.
Ariel
CMInet, the AppleTalk Amiga networking solution.
Multiport board — this two serial, one parallel port plug in card comes
complete with built in high-speed serial networking support. Features DB9
RS-232 serial port, Apple tm Macintosh tm hardware compatible 8 pin DIN
RS-422 serial port, DB25 parallel printer port, optional SCSI interface
with auto-boot ROM and all necessary utilities. For 500/1000 Amigas —
$194.98 + $6 s&h, for 2000 $149.98 + $6 s&h. Includes multi-port serial
and parallel device sortware.
In addition, a group of network software utilities are available for
$67.98. They include:
CMInet Device for RS-422 Apple Talk link access.
CMInet Manager for high speed AppleTalk protocol networking.
The serial and parallel devices are enhanced to support shared resources over
CMInet, and the parallel device also supports print spooling.
CMInet chat exchange allows multiple users to chat and exchange files over CMI
net.
CMInet monitor utility allows a CMInet node to monitor net traffic.
CMInet documentation to permit you to write your own applications.
All the above prices and information are from the current Computer Discount
Catalog (#6). 998 W. 5th Ave. Denver, CO 80204 (303) 825-2943
The current Byte has a review of localtalk-compatible ports for Mac. For a
5 Mbyte network transfer, Apple's own [claimed speed 230 kb/s] took 260
sec. When MacUser and MacWeek tested Mac IIx and Appleshare 2.0 over
localtalk, network reads are slower than local floppies while network
writes are faster. The 2 sites i've seen with localtalk nodes over 20 have
partitioned into smaller zones for more acceptable performance.
Nobody has shipped networking board for amiga beside Ameristar, but this
seems a reasonable indication of a localtalk network's speed. If the 50
kbytes/sec and 32 nodes are real world requirements , you are probably
closer to ethernet.