how to connect to ethernet

[Chip Rosenthal]

In article <1990Aug15.221258.13776 at hoss.unl.edu>
	jaffe at hoss.unl.edu (David Jaffe) writes:
>Could someone please explain what is involved in connecting an
>80386 running xenix to an ethernet cable?  Down the hall from me is
>a "thick" ethernet cable.  (I don't know what the "thick" means.)
>I have heard of various devices for tapping into the cable: dspr's,
>ethernet boards, ... .

Errr...ahhh....Which XENIX?  SCO?  What's on the ethernet?  TCP/IP?
I'm going to assume the question is, "How can I get my SCO XENIX system
to talk TCP/IP on this network?"  I hope I'm not wasting my time...

Ethernet was originally specified to run on a relatively expensive coaxial
cable.  The idea was that you would tap into this coax with a transceiver
and run another cable, the "transceiver cable", between the transceiver
and the communications device.  The transceiver cable contains four twisted
pairs, enclosed in a shield, and terminated in DB-15 connectors.

To reduce the cost of Ethernet networks, a thin-wire, or so-called
"cheapernet" version was introduced.  This uses a much less expensive
RG-58 coaxial cable.  Generally, the transceiver function would now be
integrated into the communications device, and you tap into the coax with
a simple T-connector which mates with a BNC receptacle on the communications
device.

Excluding other technologies such as twisted pair, the peecee ethernet
cards I've seen have connection for a transceiver cable, and at least
an option for an on-board thin-wire transceiver.  For example, I believe
the Excelan card is offered with or without the thin-wire transceiver, but
always includes the DB-15 connector for a transceiver cable.  The Western
Digital 8003E has both.

For your setup, you will need: (1) a transceiver to tap into the Ethernet
cable, (2) a transceiver cable to run to the peecee, (3) an Ethernet card,
and (4) I guess some software support might be nice. :-)

As far as (1) and (2)...talk to your network manager.  You'll want to use
whatever is standard for your facility -- if the fates are smiling, he or
she might already have a transceiver and cable you can use.  Numbers (3)
and (4) are intimately related.

>From here, there are two approaches:  the smart way and the dumb way, and
it's possible the dumb way is your best bet!  In the first case, there
are a number of vendors who sell an intelligent ethernet card (i.e. it
has on on-board CPU) and bundle drivers with it.  In the second case, you
can get a dumb ethernet card from somebody like Western Digital or 3Com
and purchase the software support for it.  An example of the first approach
would be the Excelan LAN Workplace for XENIX/386.  An example of the
second approach would be a WD8003 card with SCO's TCP/IP software.

I have used the Excelan package in the past.  For the most part, it works,
but I wasn't crazy about it.  My three biggest gripes were: (1) the socket
library has an archaic interface and thus porting stuff was a hassle, (2)
the smtp was a botch and I had to run smail3.1 instead (wherefore hassle
#1 comes into play), and (3) although all the basic utilities were there
(telnet, ftp, etc.) a lot of the other stuff I wanted wasn't.  (This is
based on 8-month old knowledge.  If there has been some major improvements
since then I hope somebody will correct me.)

I've got an 8003E sitting on my cabinet waiting to go into chinacat.  I
thinking about using SCO's TCP/IP, but frankly I'm not looking forward
to it.  I've got two concerns.  First, their license server which was
implemented with broadcast packets is rude and evil. Second, I think it's
overpriced:  Streams System $195 + TCP/IP Runtime $595 + TCP/IP Development
$395 = $1185.  You can get this down to $690 if you don't care about
development.

Other possibilities:

    CMC (800-968-4262)				intelligent board & SW
    Network Research Corp. (800-541-9508)	SW for 3COM/WD cards
    Racal Interlan (800-526-8225)		intelligent board & SW
    Spider Systems (Scotland, 031 554 9424)	SW, environment unknown
    Streamlined Networks (415-659-1450)		SW, environment unknown
    The Wollongong Group (800-USA-UNIX)		I think it's both HW & SW

I have no experience with these other names.  If anybody out there does,
I'd be interested in hearing about it.

-- 
Chip Rosenthal                            |  You aren't some icon carved out
chip at chinacat.Unicom.COM                  |  of soap, sent down here to clean
Unicom Systems Development, 512-482-8260  |  up my reputation.  -John Hiatt