Date: Sun, 28 Jan 1996 16:41:56 -0600 (CST) From: Joe Greco <jgreco@brasil.moneng.mei.com> To: andreas@knobel.gun.de (Andreas Klemm) Cc: dennis@etinc.com, hm@altona.hamburg.com, hackers@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: Multi-Port Async Cards Message-ID: <199601282241.QAA02142@brasil.moneng.mei.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.3.91.960128200156.246B-100000@knobel.gun.de> from "Andreas Klemm" at Jan 28, 96 08:10:23 pm
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> On Sat, 27 Jan 1996, dennis wrote: > > This scenario is frightening to me....although I think that you've answered my > > question......Its the final straw I think in making FreeBSD > > marketable...obviously > > the AST solution is unacceptable for a real ISP....I wonder why the cyclades > > board > > needs mgetty.....whats the major diff between getty and mgetty? > > Dennis, a real ISP buys a fine Terminal Server to handle several > Modem lines. Something like a Livingston Portmaster isn't too > expensive for a real ISP. Portmasters are junk. If you're going to get a specialized terminal server, buy an Annex. Or better yet,.... > Many Modem lines produce many Interrupts. Outsource this job to > another piece of hardware as an Terminal server. Let FreeBSD be > a good server machine for www an such. Use a FreeBSD box as a terminal server. Sheesh. Cheaper, easier, and spare parts are available at the corner store. I don't have ANY specialized terminal servers, routers, etc. here at sol.net.... everything runs FreeBSD and everything runs extremely well. It's very comforting knowing that in an emergency I can cover my needs within a very short period of time by either pressing other machines into double duty or simply buying new components. I've been offline for a few days now, and I'm just coming into this, but I don't know what everybody is making such a big stink about. FreeBSD works fine for dial-in applications. It has for years. Since 1.0. I moved Solaria's dial-in lines to a 386DX/16 with 4 16550 ports running FreeBSD 1.0 way back when, and I was incredibly impressed with the throughput and low CPU loading (much of which is thanks to the 16550, Suns don't have buffered serial ports). It didn't support bidir. But it did do dial-in just fine. I have yet to see a variant of FreeBSD that failed to perform admirably in this respect. I've had good experiences with serial cards designed for use with Galacticomm's "MajorBBS" and several other cards. The one questionable unit I've seen is the BocaBoard 2016. I have a lingering problem every few weeks where the interrupt line gets stuck low and can't be cleared. Unfortunately the motherboard currently in use on the box with the BB2016 doesn't handle resets correctly and it wedges on a reboot - else I would say that the board is "reliable enough" because it's easy to detect when the interrupt line gets stuck, and I could have an automated test-n-reboot if it weren't for the bad reset.. Basically I think that any sio-driven card with full modem handshaking should be very adequate. What about Digiboard, Specialix, etc.? I don't know. I don't have any intelligent cards. But with the cost of a 486DX4/120 motherboard being around $200, I don't see a real problem letting my terminal servers take the interrupt hits. ... Joe ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Joe Greco - Systems Administrator jgreco@ns.sol.net Solaria Public Access UNIX - Milwaukee, WI 414/342-4847
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