[comp.unix.xenix] Computone Intelliport Serial Board

romwa@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (Royal Ontario Museum) (03/26/89)

With reference to a posting last week about problems with
linking HDB uucp and "old" uucp Xenix, I think the problem is
due to a brain damaged Computone Intelliport card.  This
cluster controller works fine with standard dumb terminals on
it, but fails miserably with uucp and kermit file transfers
between the Xenix box and a PC.  Seems like it cannot handle
steady streams of data.

Computone knows about the problems and they said they are
working on it.  How can they release serial boards that can't
do uucp????  Don't they test anything down there?

Also, I cannot get a standard Hayes 2400 modem to work
consistently on this board.  The modem correctly picks up the
line on dial in  but there is no carrier as the Computone board seems
not to be communicating with the modem.  Occasionally, after a
disable/enable sequence the modem will work correctly for one
call, then the line goes into outer space again, until some
fortuitous sequence of events such as a reboot or dis/enable
sets things right.

Any help on the modem part of these problems would be
appreciated.  

How about posting the register and parameter settings for a
2400 baud Hayes modem that is working on a Computone board?

Thanks in advance.
Mark T. Dornfeld
Royal Ontario Museum
100 Queens Park
Toronto, Ontario, CANADA
M5S 2C6

mark@utgpu!rom      - or -     romwa@utgpu

steve@jack.UUCP (Steven Harrison) (03/29/89)

In article <1989Mar26.091015.1214@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu> romwa@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (Royal Ontario Museum) writes:
>With reference to a posting last week about problems with
>linking HDB uucp and "old" uucp Xenix, I think the problem is
>due to a brain damaged Computone Intelliport card.  This
>cluster controller works fine with standard dumb terminals on
>it, but fails miserably with uucp and kermit file transfers
>between the Xenix box and a PC.  Seems like it cannot handle
>steady streams of data.
>
I do not know who you have talked to at Computone nor am I sure if you really
believe what you are saying but let me say this.  We have been using their
boards for about five years now on a number of different machines, and
a variety of modems. This includes a 300 Hayes modem and most recently a
Telebit Trailblazer.  By the way we have used a number of UUCp's including
System 5.3 HDB and all have worked just fine!

I would suggest that you look at your configurations in /atx/attype and verify
that you understand how these work. All of this is, of course based on the
fact that you really are having trouble.

>Computone knows about the problems and they said they are
>working on it.  How can they release serial boards that can't
>do uucp????  Don't they test anything down there?
>
You are right how could they release something that doesn't work?????

Problem seems to be on the other end not in Georgia.  Again I recommend you
look closely at configurations in the file mentioned above and maybe even
your own hardware.  We certainly have not sold every possible combination 
that there is on the market today.

>Also, I cannot get a standard Hayes 2400 modem to work
>consistently on this board.  The modem correctly picks up the
>line on dial in  but there is no carrier as the Computone board seems
>not to be communicating with the modem.  Occasionally, after a
>disable/enable sequence the modem will work correctly for one
>call, then the line goes into outer space again, until some
>fortuitous sequence of events such as a reboot or dis/enable
>sets things right.
>
Let's face it Hayes modems are not the best modems in the world to use
for bi-directional UUCP traffic.  I would suggest that you set your
dialers scripts such that &D2 and &C0 are set for dialing out, and &D2 and &C1 are set for dialing in.  Make sure you reset the modem at the beginning
of the dialer script also, so that you can be assured of some known
state.



-----
J. Steven Harrison
Systems'n'Software
1624 Brookes Ave.
San Diego, California  92103-5111
(619) 542-0608
UUCP: ucsd!jack!steve
ARPA: ucsd!jack!steve@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu

romwa@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (Royal Ontario Museum) (03/29/89)

In article <774@jack.UUCP> steve@jack.UUCP (Steven Harrison) writes:
>In article <1989Mar26.091015.1214@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu> romwa@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (Royal Ontario Museum) writes:
>>With reference to a posting last week about problems with
>>linking HDB uucp and "old" uucp Xenix, I think the problem is
>>due to a brain damaged Computone Intelliport card.  This
>>cluster controller works fine with standard dumb terminals on
>>it, but fails miserably with uucp and kermit file transfers
>>between the Xenix box and a PC.  Seems like it cannot handle
>>steady streams of data.
>>
>I do not know who you have talked to at Computone nor am I sure if you really
>believe what you are saying but let me say this.  We have been using their
>boards for about five years now on a number of different machines, and
>a variety of modems. This includes a 300 Hayes modem and most recently a
>Telebit Trailblazer.  By the way we have used a number of UUCp's including
>System 5.3 HDB and all have worked just fine!
>
>I would suggest that you look at your configurations in /atx/attype and verify
                                                         ^^^^^^^^^
Steve, I really am having problems with this board.  I can see
from the above file reference that you do not have their
latest products.  I, too, have successfully used their older
boards for the last 4 years.  Their new "Intelliport" cluster
controller is based on a NEC V50 cluster controller chip. It
is on a single board with four multiplexed high speed serial
connectors.  Up to four 16 port cluster boxes can be attached
as far away as 2000'.  (We are limiting our cable runs to a
couple hundred feet.)  This cabling scheme keeps our false
ceilings a bit tidier and the cabling costs down.

It seems to me they must have a polling or time slicing scheme
running that does not give a uucp port enough time to get
large chunks of data through.  That it failed with a simple PC
to Xenix kermit transfer also says there is something wrong.

When I called, they admitted the problem and were "working on
it".  In the long run, they'll fix it, I hope.

>
>>Also, I cannot get a standard Hayes 2400 modem to work
>>consistently on this board.  The modem correctly picks up the
>>line on dial in  but there is no carrier as the Computone board seems
>>not to be communicating with the modem.  Occasionally, after a
>>disable/enable sequence the modem will work correctly for one
>>call, then the line goes into outer space again, until some
>>fortuitous sequence of events such as a reboot or dis/enable
>>sets things right.
>>
>Let's face it Hayes modems are not the best modems in the world to use
>for bi-directional UUCP traffic.  I would suggest that you set your
>dialers scripts such that &D2 and &C0 are set for dialing out, and &D2 and &C1 are set for dialing in.  Make sure you reset the modem at the beginning
>of the dialer script also, so that you can be assured of some known
>state.

Looks like I learned the hard way.  Each time I cu to the
modem to work on the set up and then try to enable the line,
it doesn't come up.  All that it needed was a hardware reset.
>
>-----
>J. Steven Harrison
>Systems'n'Software

Mark T. Dornfeld
Royal Ontario Museum
100 Queens Park
Toronto, Ontario, CANADA
M5S 2C6

mark@utgpu!rom      - or -     romwa@utgpu

gillisb@mist.cs.orst.edu (Brian Gillis) (03/29/89)

In article <1989Mar28.235134.4956@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu> romwa@gpu.utcs.UUCP (Royal Ontario Museum) writes:
>In article <774@jack.UUCP> steve@jack.UUCP (Steven Harrison) writes:
>>In article <1989Mar26.091015.1214@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu> romwa@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (Royal Ontario Museum) writes:
>>>With reference to a posting last week about problems with
>>>linking HDB uucp and "old" uucp Xenix, I think the problem is
>>>due to a brain damaged Computone Intelliport card.  This
>>>cluster controller works fine with standard dumb terminals on
>>>it, but fails miserably with uucp and kermit file transfers
>>>between the Xenix box and a PC.  Seems like it cannot handle
>>>steady streams of data.
>>>

I too have had this problem with computone's AT16 product. I was very
amazed that it could not handle 9600bps cu connection with another Xenix
system without a loss of data.  However, I was able to overcome the problem
by increasing the CPU time spent on the important ports. You might try
this method if your Computone product allows it.

Brian
gillisb@gsd.UUCP