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PCI LocalTalk?
- Thread starter Gil
- Start date
For the B&W G3, there were solutions like the Stealth Serial Port and gPort which replaced your modem, both of which gave you a proper Mac serial port with full LocalTalk capability. There were also PCI serial cards with 2 - 4 serial ports made by companies such as KeySpan - though whether they support LocalTalk is anyone's guess.
Hmm...I have something set up now where IP is encapsulated in AppleTalk protocol. Though really, I want to hook a PC to a LocalTalk network (for fun, of course) so I'm basically looking for something that serves the OPPOSITE purpose of the AsanteTalk. It probably works both ways, though.
Thanks!
MacIP, encapsulates IP in DDP. It registers the types IPGATEWAY and IPADDRESS with NBP.
The best solution is Windows 2000 Advanced Server, it has the whole she-bang of Services For Macintosh. I use it as a file server for my macs, including a classic and macplus over localtalk.
Also NTFS will happily store resource forks as a separate stream of the same file. None of the messing around that netatalk does.
Yes.
Windows 2000 Server is convenient and easy to get going if you have a Windows network and just want to share the odd file here and there with one or two Macs.
Unfortunately, it makes a nasty replacement for a proper AppleShare server in a predominately Mac environment. Microsoft intended Services For Macintosh to ease the transition from Mac to Windows and as such, had no motivation to make Windows act as a fast file server for Mac clients.
For starters, it's single threaded. This becomes painfully obvious when a Mac user attempts to search a shared drive with lots of files on it: all other Mac clients virtually stop until the server completes the search operation (yuk). In addition, it doesn't understand encapsulated IP in Mac packets... and then you still have to find a Windows compatible LocalTalk card or an ethernet to localtalk router/bridge.
I'm not sure that there is a universal solution, but I get on reasonably well using a FreeBSD box with Netatalk for Macs + Samba for Windows machines. A dedicated Ethernet to LocalTalk router that understands TCP/IP encapsulation takes care of my LocalTalk only Macs.
[Edit: and yes, Netatalk can be messy and a pain in the bum to get going if you've never used it before]
Unfortunately, it makes a nasty replacement for a proper AppleShare server in a predominately Mac environment. Microsoft intended Services For Macintosh to ease the transition from Mac to Windows and as such, had no motivation to make Windows act as a fast file server for Mac clients.
For starters, it's single threaded. This becomes painfully obvious when a Mac user attempts to search a shared drive with lots of files on it: all other Mac clients virtually stop until the server completes the search operation (yuk). In addition, it doesn't understand encapsulated IP in Mac packets... and then you still have to find a Windows compatible LocalTalk card or an ethernet to localtalk router/bridge.
I'm not sure that there is a universal solution, but I get on reasonably well using a FreeBSD box with Netatalk for Macs + Samba for Windows machines. A dedicated Ethernet to LocalTalk router that understands TCP/IP encapsulation takes care of my LocalTalk only Macs.
[Edit: and yes, Netatalk can be messy and a pain in the bum to get going if you've never used it before]
I'm not quite sure where Windows 2000 server comes into this...I'm not looking to share anything. (maybe I didn't make that clear?) I already have Macs with AppleShare installed. I just want to connect a PC (WinXP) to a LocalTalk, specifically PhoneNet network. AppleTalk would probably work right off the bat (provided PC MacLan is installed), but I wouldn't know how to go about unpacking the MacIP packets.
No, a Mac running the LocalTalk bridge software is "dumb" - it just shuffles packets back and forth without modifying them: it doesn't know how to encapsulate IP in them, hence the name "bridge". As Gil mentioned, there are other software products that can do this. The old "Apple Internet Router" software was one I used back in the day. A Mac IIsi or IIcx with an ethernet card and AIR software made a pretty good router, but software solutions are never as reliable or fuss free as a hardware router.
There were a number of hardware AppleTalk routers in the day. I use an "EtherRoute TCP" made by a company called Compatible Systems. It has 2 x LocalTalk port and a single 10Mb ethernet port. There were a number of similar devices. The "Webster MultiGate" was popular with schools, since it had 4 (some models more?) LocalTalk ports. By breaking a classroom of 20 or so Mac Pluses or Classics down into 4 smaller LocalTalk LANs, it was possible to dramatically improve network performance. Cisco had some support for MacIP through an optional (extra $$$) feature set on their routers, but I'm not sure if they did LocalTalk support as well.
Windows XP has support for the AppleTalk protocol and can print to an AppleTalk printer. It doesn't know how to share files (either as a client or a server).
Shiva FastPath has a built-in TCP/IP->MacIP translator of some sort. http://ps-2.kev009.com:8081/wct/fastpath5/faq.htm
Peace,
Drew
