Farallon PhoneNet NuBus - useable for Ethernet broadband?

[Huxley]

Hi guys,

I've installed my only NuBus network card into my snazzy new Mac IIfx, but I'm having some issues. The card is a Farallon PhoneNet card (with an Ethernet-like socket and a second port that looks just like the old-style monitor connection), but I'm unable to get the Mac to see it as an available network option. I've looked for a good driver for it, but the only one I can find ("Fast EN Nubus Installer") says that it can't find a 10/100 Nubus Ethernet card in my Mac.

Any ideas, or should I just start looking for an Apple-brand network card?

Thanks!

Huxley

 

[equill]

If ethernet networking is your goal, a PhoneNet card will not achieve it. For starters, the Farallon installer could not find a fast ethernet (10/100Base-T) card, which was a fairly positive indication. PhoneNet is a proprietary name of alternative hardware for serial communication with Apple's LocalTalk, which is also a hardware monicker, used to implement AppleTalk. Farallon's PhoneNet was just a cheaper (than Apple's) implementation of the cabling for serial-port communication. There were a few fast NuBus ethernet cards made, by Farallon and Asanté at least, but they are much less common than Thin-net (10Base-2), Thick (10Base-5), UTP (10Base-T) and combinations thereof. It is also conceivable that your card is a NuBus LocalTalk to ethernet bridge. I've never heard of one, but that doesn't prevent the device from existing.

But your reference to the DB-15 port on the same card is puzzling. It sounds as if it is an AUI port, an older standard port style for ethernet. It should have clasps instead of nuts to hold a cable's connector snug and secure. Does it? Farallon's cattle-dog number for the card might help us to diagnose it and help you. Is the other port an RJ-45 (wider than a telephone socket) or an RJ-11?

de

 

[Huxley]

But your reference to the DB-15 port on the same card is puzzling. It sounds as if it is an AUI port, an older standard port style for ethernet. It should have clasps instead of nuts to hold a cable's connector snug and secure. Does it? Farallon's cattle-dog number for the card might help us to diagnose it and help you. Is the other port an RJ-45 (wider than a telephone socket) or an RJ-11?
de

As usual, you've provided some great info - thanks again!

Regarding this particular card, it does indeed have an RJ-45 socket, along with a bright green LED that lit up when I plugged in my Ethernet cable (coming from my AirPort Extreme's wired socket), and a DB-15 connection with some funky clasps. Along the top of the card, there's one socketed IC (looks like a standard ROM chip) with a sticker reading "P/N 160126." Also, near the bottom of the card (about an inch in front of the NuBus socket) there's a 3-pin jumper labeled "LINK BEAT E100," and it's currently jumpered in the "ON" position.

Anyway, this card is somewhat curious, as I can't find any reference to that part number on the Net. Again, thanks for your endless patience with my often newbie-level questions. You guys are the best.

Huxley

 

[Bunsen]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhoneNet

In other words, it's not Ethernet

 

[Charlieman]

Farallon slapped the PhoneNet label on some products that aren't PhoneNet, before realising tha this confused buyers. Cards of this generation may not be able to autosense which ethernet port is active. It is possible that the jumper sets the port to RJ45 or AUI. Alternatively, the jumper may be required to configure 10-BaseT to work with some old ethernet hubs. I'd leave it alone for now.

Download the System 7.5 Network Access Disk (a single floppy image) which works with many third party ethernet cards as well as Apple's. Alternatively, try using System 7.5.x.

 

[Huxley]

Well, a return trip to my Magical Garage of Wonders turned up a different Farallon card to try - this time, it's a Farallon Etherwave Nubus PN890. This one sports a pair of RJ-45 sockets (and a pair of blinkenlights for each! Yay!).

I'm gonna pop this into my IIfx right now and see what happens.

Wish me luck!

Huxley

PS This card came attached to some sort of right-angle adapter/bracket thing labeled "NUBUS ADAPTER CARD." Any idea what this thing is or what machine it'd be used in?

 

[Patrickool93]

Probably IIsi or 610/6100s. They had a PDS slot that had a card to turn it into NuBus, and it turned the card sideways so the ports were on the back of the computer.

 

[Huxley]

Well, I'm totally psyched to report that I'm posting this from my Mac IIfx! While this system isn't going to win any awards for speedy browsing, it's fun to see a 17+ year old computer online. Plus, I was getting tired of burning 800 meg CD's on my iMac G4 just to shuttle 1 or 2 megs worth of downloads to the IIfx.

Hooray for old technology!

Huxley

 

[equill]

Olde-Mac-Milt still has a Farallon PN890-TP EtherWave 10-Base-T card on sale from his eBay 'Shoppe', being one of two that he has offered for a while. An interesting beast that allows (it has a pass-through RJ-45 pair of ports) daisy-chaining another Mac without the need for two Macs to share a hub.

That same divergent thinking by Farallon may have been responsible for the card that you tried before. In quite a bit of Googling I was not able to confirm it, but the suspicion remained strong, and was supported by hints that I found, that your card was indeed a PhoneNET (LocalTalk) to ethernet bridge, as shown by its willingness to acknowledge an upstream ethernet connection, but it failed to respond to a fast ethernet driver's installer because it was but a 10Base-T card. The ports that you mentioned do not support this hypothesis, unless there is also an RJ-11 in addition to the AUI and RJ-45.

Then again, as Charlieman wrote, perhaps it was just a misapplication of the PhoneNET label by Farallon, and the driver installation failed because the card was old enough (as shown by the presence of the AUI port) to need attachment to a 10Base-T hub to overcome its inability to autonegotiate a full duplex connection.

If there is an RJ-11 connector, you may care, at some time, to experiment with a daisy-chained PhoneNET network hanging off that card, if only to verify its intended purpose.

de