Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!apple!agate!dog.ee.lbl.gov!nosc!humu!pegasus!richard
From: richard@pegasus.com (Richard Foulk)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sysv386
Subject: Son of FAS?
Summary: faster drivers for cheap serial cards?
Message-ID: <1991Apr25.010758.1522@pegasus.com>
Date: 25 Apr 91 01:07:58 GMT
Organization: Pegasus,  Honolulu
Lines: 16

I recall hearing that Equinox (or someone like that) equips their
smart serial card with a driver that doesn't use interrupts.  They
do some kind of polling from within one of the kernels inner loops.

Doing away with the interrupt overhead supposedly results in a marked
performance gain.  (Seems reasonable.)

My question is: couldn't this same technique be used to good advantage
with the fifo-ized dumb serial cards?

Since most smart cards gain mostly from the reduced interrupt load they
place on the system wouldn't this blur the difference a bit more?


-- 
Richard Foulk		richard@pegasus.com