km@mathcs.emory.edu (Ken Mandelberg) (05/16/91)
Would it be feasible to connect to adjacent workstations (Suns in this
case) using scsi? Would you expect to be able to get better than ethernet
throuhput on bulk transfers. There would be no peripherals competing on
this connection.
--
Ken Mandelberg | km@mathcs.emory.edu PREFERRED
Emory University | {rutgers,gatech}!emory!km UUCP
Dept of Math and CS | km@emory.bitnet NON-DOMAIN BITNET
Atlanta, GA 30322 | Phone: Voice (404) 727-7963, FAX 727-5611dlt@wacker (Don Turrell) (05/19/91)
km@mathcs.emory.edu (Ken Mandelberg) writes: > Would it be feasible to connect to adjacent workstations (Suns in this > case) using scsi? Would you expect to be able to get better than ethernet > throuhput on bulk transfers. There would be no peripherals competing on > this connection. > > -- > Ken Mandelberg | km@mathcs.emory.edu PREFERRED > Emory University | {rutgers,gatech}!emory!km UUCP > Dept of Math and CS | km@emory.bitnet NON-DOMAIN BITNET > Atlanta, GA 30322 | Phone: Voice (404) 727-7963, FAX 727-5611 THe SCSI protocol has provisions for allowing the bus to be used for system to system communication. My company Performace Technologies has carved out a nitch in supplying SCSI Host adapters on the VMEbus that can be run back to back for system communication. The SCSIbus rates are 3-5 Mbytes/sec (24-40 Mbits/sec) vs ethernet (10 Mbits/sec at its best). So SCSI can be used for an effect system to system link with good performance capability. That's the good news..... The bad news is you just can't connect two SCSI adapters together and have them communicate. For instance our SCSI Host Adapter on VME has substantial firmware onboard (it is an intelligent adapter) to handle packetizing of the data when it is communicating with an other Host Adapter (vs a disk or tape drive on the SCSIbus). The software driver (ie in the SUN) must also be able to support this type of operation (the standard SUN driver does not do this). So in principle using SCSI for system to system communication provides a great high speed standard link (even for going dissimilar system to dissimilar system). However the standard SUN implementation (hardware and software) is not set up to support this use of the SCSIbus. Have I scared you off???...if not contact me by e-mail (dlt@pt.com) and I can give you somemore details on this subject. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- | Above are my opinions..only!!..not those of Performance Technologies | | ---------------------------------------------------------------------| | Don Turrell | Phone: 716-586-6727 | | Performance Technologies | FAX: 716-586-6707 | | 435 West Commercial Street | uucp: | | East Rochester, NY 14445 USA | ..!uupsi!wingman!wacker!dlt | ----------------------------------------------------------------------