Re: Linux for Beginners

>
> From: Jon Elson <jmelson@...>
>
> From: Bob Bachman <bobach@...>
>
> >
> > Jon,
> >
> > Thanks for the response. How do you connect the two boxes? Serial? Network
> > cards?
> > I have some WD network cards which are supported by Linux.
>
> Yes, I got PCI Ethernet cards for most of the machines, but the CNC
> machine has an ISA card. I chose thinwire ethernet (10-base-5) over
> twisted pair (10-base-T) because it didn't require a hub, and I knew
> the technology well. Actually, I have at least 6 machines that could,
> potentially, be hooked up.
>

You can hook two 10baseT cards together without a hub with a special cable that
reverses one pair of wires. On the other hand, you can buy a pocket hub
for $29 these days.

I used to like thinnet, but given today's technology it's more trouble
than it's worth. We ended up ripping it out of our university labs
when I ran them and we recently got rid of the last bits on our
internal net. If you get a problem with one cable it will take down
the entire segment. Not a big deal if you only have 2 computers
connected, but a real pain if there are more and you have to try to
track down the bad cable.

The other advantage with 10baseT is you can upgrade to 100 Mb ethernet
by swapping the hub if you use 10/100 cards in the nodes. (Of course,
you have to use cat5 wiring, but that's not a big deal either)

As for ethernet cards, we've had very good experience with the LinkSys
Etherfast 10/100 cards. They work great in both Linux and Windows, are
reasonably cheap and will work on both 10 Mb and 100 Mb ethernet. In
the FWIW department, they're based on the DEC tulip ethernet chip which
has a long sucessful track record.

Paul

--
Paul Amaranth | Rochester MI, USA
Aurora Group, Inc. | Software Development
paul@... | Unix / C / Tcl-Tk