[rescue] wifi ethernet on SPARCstation 10

systems_glitch systems.glitch at gmail.com
Fri Jul 19 10:55:56 CDT 2019


Yes, those SBus -> PCMCIA adapters do exist, I have a number of them. I
bought a bunch in the mid 2000s to use with some SPARCclassic machines to
build some Linux-based 802.11 APs for an experimental long distance link on
the farm. I used them with both Orinoco Gold cards (Cabletron branded) and
Senao 200 mW high power cards. Worked fine with Debian/SPARC. Never tried
to use wireless under SunOS/Solaris.

I suspect it'd work under NetBSD or OpenBSD. It's listed on the NetBSD
hardware compat list as supported.

Thanks,
Jonathan

On Fri, Jul 19, 2019 at 10:21 AM Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:

>  sigh dyslexia:  s/networking good/networking group/
>
> On Fri, Jul 19, 2019 at 10:19 AM Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > On Fri, Jul 19, 2019 at 9:30 AM john <jferg977 at aol.com> wrote:
> >
> >> I've got an Orinoco Gold card but haven't tried it.
> >>
> > I'm doing this from memory, which is a tad dangerous, but IIRC the AT&T
> > Orinoco card used the same Si that the DEC card used [the chip was done
> as
> > a joint project between the DEC networking good and AT&T Allentown - one
> of
> > my brothers worked on it at AT&T].  It's possible the base chips were
> > slightly different, but I thought the only real difference in the final
> > product was DEC used the radio's developed for RoamAbout - which took a
> bit
> > more power, but as I said could talk to just about anything.  The Si was
> > fab'ed at both AT&T Allentown and DEC Hudson [and IIRC DEC solid the
> rights
> > to that and the Tulip to Marvell at one point.  Intel will later sell
> them
> > the rest of StrongARM stuff when they got of the direct ARM business a
> few
> > years later].
> >
> > Anyway at the time, the stock Compaq WiFi PCMCIA card used Si that came
> > from somebody else, who's name I forget these days; but that chip much
> > cheaper to make/purchase than the AT&T/DEC Si; but as I said previously,
> it
> > only worked if you were right on top of the AP and had a clear line of
> > sight to it.
> >
> > Clem
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue


More information about the rescue mailing list