Minimal H/W configuration??? (Terminal Server?)
Jonathan Bayer
jbayer at ispi.UUCP
Wed Aug 30 21:51:37 AEST 1989
yap at me.utoronto.ca (Davin Yap) writes:
>I was just wondering how practical it would be to use a bare-bones 386
>box running xenix as a terminal server. I'd appreciate answers to any of
>the following questions or any suggestions in general. As a barometer
>the cost of a 16 port terminal server here in Toronto is about $13,000 CDN
>(or $10,800 US). For those of you who don't know what a terminal server
>is, it's just a box you attach to your ethernet, with lots of serial
>ports you can attach terminals to, and login to other machines.
>The idea is to buy a cheap 386 box, sans HD, an ethernet board, a
>couple(?) serial port boards, and (I suppose) run tcp/ip, then telnet to
>the various hosts.
>Questions:
>1) Is it viable to run Xenix without a HD, even with no entries in the
> crontab (geez I don't even know if Xenix has a crontab :-), and just
> the bare minimum of processes running? I'd like to use one perhaps
> two 1.44 meg drives.
No. You need a hard disk even if it is a slow 10 meg drive.
>2) I'm assuming you can run tcp/ip under xenix. Am I assuming too much?
Yes you can.
>3) What is the maximum number of serial ports one can access under
> Xenix? What is the PRACTICAL limit (as a note, I've been told you
> can't have more than 8 serial ports on a PC, but I'm assuming that
> this is under DOS)?
On a 386 you should be able to run a maximum of 64 serial ports (4 16-port
cards). As a practical matter you will probably want intelligent cards to
relive the cpu of all the interrupts.
>4) How much ram would you need for such an implementation? That is, if
> each user is running a telnet, how much memory do you need for each
> user? Here, I'm assuming that it's koser to put 'exec telnet' as the
> first line in each users .profile (there's just gotta be a bourne
> shell :-). How much memory does the kernal require?
Yes, there is a bourne shell. The kernal for a basic system will take
up about 3-400 K. Yes, you will be able to do an exec telnet. Ram is a
different matter. Understanding that this is a guestimate, I figure that
you will need about 4 meg, for up to 32 users, more for the 64 users.
>5) How much (approx.) would a unlimited user, no frills Xenix cost?
About $ 600
>If this turns out to be a viable alternative (10.8K US is a lotta dough
>for something not really impressive), would anyone be interested in going
>into business with me? You can have the US, I'll take Canada ;^)
>We can cooperate by ironing out the technical difficulties, and perhaps
>go in on some bulk purchases. There are worst ways of making a profit
>(I don't know the smiley for tongue-in-cheek)
It is a viable alternative. The total cost would come to about $ 5000,
depending on how much ram and how many serial ports you will end up using.
>But seriously - THANKS to all who reply,
Your welcome.
--
Jonathan Bayer Intelligent Software Products, Inc.
(201) 245-5922 500 Oakwood Ave.
jbayer at ispi.COM Roselle Park, NJ 07204
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