Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!sequent!ccssrv!perry
From: perry@ccssrv.UUCP (Perry Hutchison)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.lans
Subject: Re: Ethernet max length problems
Summary: Yes there is such a thing as an Ethernet repeater
Keywords: repeaters? ethernet too long
Message-ID: <647@ccssrv.UUCP>
Date: 21 Sep 89 03:56:32 GMT
References: <634@elan.elan.com>
Reply-To: perry@ccssrv.UUCP (Perry Hutchison)
Organization: Control-C Software, Inc., Beaverton, OR
Lines: 26

In article <634@elan.elan.com> jlo@elan.com (Jeff Lo) writes:

> what I am looking for is ... a repeater or something, if such a thing exists
> for ethernet, to allow us to seemingly have one long (>185m) ethernet.

Such a thing does exist.  We have here a 3Com box called a MultiConnect
Repeater.  I believe it can support up to 15 branches, each of which can be
of the maximum length permitted for whatever connection technology that branch
uses.  We currently have two thin-ethernet branches, one of about 150m and
the other about 250m.  (We are aware that the 250m branch exceeds
specification.  It nonetheless works pretty well most of the time.  We are
planning to split it in half -- this will require adding a third interface
card to the repeater.)

I suspect that 3Com may not be the only manufacturer of such things, and that
this particular repeater may not be their only offering.  I would suggest
checking with (at least):

  3Com
  Western Digital
  Gateway
  the manufacturer(s) of your installation's Ethernet cards.

No particular recommendations implied here -- I just happen to know that
3Com, WD, and Gateway make Ethernet products.  There are almost certainly
others.