jeff@xanadu.com (Jeff Crilly N6ZFX) (09/05/90)
In article <1990Sep03.003401.13086@virtech.uucp> cpcahil@virtech.uucp (Conor P. Cahill) writes: >Welcome to the comp.unix.sysv386 newsgroup. This newsgroup (actually the [blah blah blah....] >9. What are good intelligent multi-port serial card solutions? > > This is yet another religous issue. The following cards are > available for AT bus systems. Note that the cards are listed > in alphabetical order and that this should not be taken as a > recommendation of any one card over the others. > Specialix > Specialix provides a series of serial port solutions. I > have no experience/pricing info on these cards. > I have some experience with this product that I thought I'd share with the group. I bought a specialix si/32 (host card + 4 8 port terminal adaptors for a total of 32 ports) last year (october 89). The system I am using is an Everex Step 25 (25mhz '386) running SCO Unix V.3.2. First off I should say that I am not using these ports for general unix logins. They are used by a single program running on the machine that accepts data from one or more of the serial ports. The program also writes data to the ports. This ports are, however, attached to modems, so I can give a little insight on that area. We were looking for a machine that could support 32 serial ports at a price under $10k. We had condsidered Suns but the serial io on those guys leaves a little to be desired. Hence the 386 and the Specialix. I won't go into details of our application here, but will try to convey as much information as possible about the card. First some initial observations. There are two parts to the system. A host card (which is half length) and 1 or more "terminal adapters" (TA). Each terminal adapter supports eight ports with full modem control on each port. The TAs are daisy chained together by a mating plug and socket on each side of each box. Up to four terminal adapters may be connected together providing 32 ports. The specialix people tell me that you can put two cards in the host which gives you 64 ports. There are a couple mechanical problems that I noticed with the system. First, the mating of the TAs is not very good. It turns out there are some tolerance problems and as a result the plugs and sockets don't fully mate. Specialix tries to solve the problem by providing straps that screw onto the side of the TAs. Unfortunately the design of these uses self taping screws which tend to strip easily and the design of the strap just doesn't provide a secure and tight connection. Second, a similar problem exists with the host adapter. The back panel plate that the connector is on does not slide directly into the AT case slot. Likewise the screw hole is also off. I had to bend the back panel plate to make it fit. The folks at specialix told me that their supplier sent them the wrong connectors and this was why the tolerances were wrong. I believe they might be shipping units that have these problems solved, but be aware of it....they wouldn't replace mine with new ones. Installation was not too rough. However the first host adapter I received was giving me all sorts of problems. After replacing it everything worked fine. For about six months the system had an intermittent problem: Occasionally it would not pass data to the application from any serial ports. Rebooting the system fixed it. Specialix support was disappointing in solving the problem. Seriously, they were convinced that the problem was not with their card or TAs. Finally one day the problem became repeatable. I swapped TAs and narrowed it down to a bad TA. I took it back to Basic Time (my dealer) and they tested it in house and gave me a new one immediately. I have not installed the new TA yet due to lack of time and other things but the system has been working great since discovering that problem. One thing you should know before buying is that the TAs serial ports are configured as DTE devices. This means that if you going to use terminals, then its no sweat hooking em up. If you are going to use modems (like me) then you need a *special* kind of null modem (because DTR is straight through) which I had to get manufactured. Software drivers: Initially I received version 1.02 with the card. There were several bugs that existed in this version which I won't go into because they are now shipping version 3.04 which seems to have solved alot of problems. The drivers support the select() system call which is important to my application. Specialix was also *very* *very* helpful in providing information to allow me to retrieve the status of DTR, DCD, and DSR from the card. This was crucial to my application. One problem with the driver is that select() on the SI driver does not behave exactly the same as if I was using the one of the COM ports. However I was able to work around the problem. Specialix told me that this was really a SCO problem but I didn't understand why it works with the dumb serial card/SCO driver and not the Specialix. (The problem was that select() would not unblock if the serial device had been opened when DCD was asserted). They claim that the card works with MultiScreens (tm of SCO). I haven't tested it in that capacity. As for throughput; they claim 38.4kbps. It works up there but I haven't tried any load testing. I should note that there were some problems running at that speed with version 1.02 of the driver so I dropped the speed down to 19.2kbps. Version 3.04 may fix this problem. I can't imagine that it doesn't; though I haven't been able to test it and 19.2 kbps is o.k. for my application. The card was about $1800 for the 32 ports. I think the breakdown is $200 for the card and $400 for each 8 port TA. The reason I selected it was (1) I needed full modem control on all ports and (2) the Specialix guys assured me that it would work with select, while other manufactures told me that their product would not or might not. It is a pretty good product that I am sure will improve over time. I am pleased with it and to date have not seen another product that offers the same capabilities for my application (other than some SparcStation 1 [4/60] S-bus based stuff). Jeff Crilly (N6ZFX) AMIX Corporation 2345 Yale Street Palo Alto, CA 94306 jeff@amix.com, {uunet,sun}!markets!jeff
ed@maxed.amg.com (0000-Admin(0000)) (09/07/90)
In article <1990Sep5.014036.10985@xanadu.com> you write: >In article <1990Sep03.003401.13086@virtech.uucp> cpcahil@virtech.uucp (Conor P. Cahill) writes: >>Welcome to the comp.unix.sysv386 newsgroup. This newsgroup (actually the ... >> Specialix >> Specialix provides a series of serial port solutions. I >> have no experience/pricing info on these cards. >> > > >I have some experience with this product that I thought I'd share with >the group. > ... The drivers are up to 4.0 now, and work with ISC 2.2 just fine, hardware flow control works, the outboard terminal adapters mate properly, and our units have functioned properly serving terminals and modems--always. -- Ed Whittemore uunet!maxed!ed ed@maxed.amg.com American Micro Group, Inc. 201-944-3293
alan@mq.UUCP (Alan H. Mintz) (09/08/90)
Summ additions to Jeff's review: In article <1990Sep5.014036.10985@xanadu.com>, jeff@xanadu.com (Jeff Crilly N6ZFX) writes: > > Specialix > > Specialix provides a series of serial port solutions. I > > have no experience/pricing info on these cards. > > > > There are a couple mechanical problems that I noticed with > the system. First, the mating of the TAs is not very good. It turns > out there are some tolerance problems and as a result the plugs and > sockets don't fully mate. Specialix tries to solve the problem > by providing straps that screw onto the side of the TAs. Unfortunately > the design of these uses self taping screws which tend to strip easily > and the design of the strap just doesn't provide a secure and tight > connection. Yup!. Our solution is to remove the back panels of the TAs and screw them down to an aluminum plate. We had some of these plates cut and drilled at the local metal shop. > Second, a similar problem exists with the host adapter. > The back panel plate that the connector is on does not slide directly > into the AT case slot. Likewise the screw hole is also off. I had > to bend the back panel plate to make it fit. The folks at specialix > told me that their supplier sent them the wrong connectors and this > was why the tolerances were wrong. I believe they might be shipping > units that have these problems solved, but be aware of it....they > wouldn't replace mine with new ones. I haven't had any trouble (really) with the host boards fitting in machines. I do find it fairly common to have to bend backplates on various cards with various machines. It seems that the PC mfrs and PC card mfrs "loosely" interpret the physical specs for add-on cards (if there are any). They have had the connector problem with the TA-8s for as long as I can remember. I suspect the stuff about the wrong connectors is, well, bogus. The backplate solves this problem permanently. > One thing you should know before buying is that the TAs serial ports > are configured as DTE devices. ^^^ I think you mean DCE :-) > As for throughput; they claim 38.4kbps. > It works up there but I haven't tried any load testing. I should note We use them at 38400 routinely (over short distances) - no prob. I have seen a number of benchmarks from competing boards that all rate the SI pretty well. -- We tend to use Specialix almost exclusively for anything more than 8 ports. Once the physical problem with the TA8s is solved, it is an excellent product. It is a UK-based company, but they also have a (small) office in Silicon Valley (with REAL technical people). They have been extremely helpful and supportive when we had a hardware failure at a system we were installing in NY (they FedExed a replacement for a defective cable to New York at 3:00 PM Friday!). I have heard that they now have a host adapter that will support up to 64 ports. I assume from conversations of two months ago that it is available for the EISA bus as well. -- < Alan H. Mintz | Voice +1 714 980 1034 > < Micro-Quick Systems, Inc. | FAX +1 714 944 3995 > < 10384 Hillside Road | uucp: ...!uunet!mq!alan > < Alta Loma, CA 91701 USA | Internet: alan@MQ.COM >
jwd@unx.sas.com (John W. DeBoskey) (09/13/90)
In article <58@mq.UUCP> alan@mq.UUCP (Alan H. Mintz) writes: >Summ additions to Jeff's review: > >In article <1990Sep5.014036.10985@xanadu.com>, jeff@xanadu.com (Jeff Crilly N6ZFX) writes: >> > Specialix >> > Specialix provides a series of serial port solutions. I >> > have no experience/pricing info on these cards. >> >> There are a couple mechanical problems that I noticed with >> the system. First, the mating of the TAs is not very good. It turns > >Yup!. Our solution is to remove the back panels of the TAs and screw them down >to an aluminum plate. We had some of these plates cut and drilled at the >local metal shop. I only have one 8 port TA so I can't comment here... > >> Second, a similar problem exists with the host adapter. >> The back panel plate that the connector is on does not slide directly >> into the AT case slot. Likewise the screw hole is also off. I had > >I haven't had any trouble (really) with the host boards fitting in machines. >I do find it fairly common to have to bend backplates on various cards >with various machines. It seems that the PC mfrs and PC card mfrs "loosely" >interpret the physical specs for add-on cards (if there are any). > I installed an SI board in a PS2 Model 80. It dropped in without a hitch. > >We tend to use Specialix almost exclusively for anything more than 8 ports. >Once the physical problem with the TA8s is solved, it is an excellent >product. It is a UK-based company, but they also have a (small) office >in Silicon Valley (with REAL technical people). They have been extremely >helpful and supportive when we had a hardware failure at a system we were >installing in NY (they FedExed a replacement for a defective cable to >New York at 3:00 PM Friday!). > Credit where credit is due. I sent email to them 10am in the morning asking about the latest rev of the device driver. Their technical support called me at 5pm, just before I was getting ready to take off. They fed'exed the driver to me and I had it the next day. To me, this helps put Specialix on the top of my GOOD COMPANY to deal with list, and if I ever get the chance to purchase from them again, I will. >I have heard that they now have a host adapter that will support up to >64 ports. I assume from conversations of two months ago that it is available >for the EISA bus as well. I'm not sure about the 64 ports, but they do have a new board. > The board you're refering to is the Specialix RIO. I won't put the sales lit here, but here are the tech specs: HOST CARD My comments CPU INMOST225 - Transputer technology Clock 25 MHz Form ISA Half AT EISA EISA MCA MCA On-board Ram 512Kbits - Yes, it say Kbits, not Kbytes Ext interface Balanced twisted pair Range 25 metres Data Rate 10Mbits/sec - With a burst of 20? Max Remotes ports/host 128 Max hosts per system 4 Max Ports 512 Ave Throughput 6Mbits/sec - Not bad.... I'm curious to hear about anyone who has one of these things. I'd be even more interested in an application that could push one of these cards to it's limits... John -- jwd@unx.sas.com (w) rti.rti.org!sas!jwd (919) 677-8000 x6915 jwd@baggins.ral.nc.us (h) mcnc.mcnc.org!baggins!jwd (919) 481-1057 (preferred)