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From: robelr@ucs.indiana.edu (Allen Robel)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.sys.cisco
Subject: Re: Caution: We are having PROBLEMS with 8.2(4)!!!!!!
Message-ID: <1991Jun18.192156.15546@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>
Date: 18 Jun 91 19:21:56 GMT
References: <1991Jun18.091614.816@arizona.edu>
Sender: news@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (USENET News System)
Organization: Indiana University
Lines: 33

In article <1991Jun18.091614.816@arizona.edu> leonard@arizona.edu writes:

> Is there reason to believe that we would suffer if we
> were to upgrade to 8.2(4)?

cisco's best guess after working with us on this (and its a pretty good one) 
is that the problems that we experienced were the result of one of our
sites setting up a Phase II router (Apple Internet router) with a 
cable-range > 1 when the rest of our network is running Phase I.
This is not a legal configuration, and we've since asked that site
to change their router configuration. 8.2(4) appears not to handle this 
situation gracefully and cisco is in the process of writing a fix.

If you're running a network based entirely on Phase II, you shouldn't
have any problems.  

Granted, this was a fairly serious error, but, mindful of the caveat 
above, I'd still recommend 8.2(4) for Phase II nets.  cisco put a lot 
into improving their Apple code in this release (we were a beta site)
and I think that they succeeded in turning out a much better product
than they started with.  I know that Apple also beta tested this release
and the guy there who was overseeing Apple's testing said that this
release was the "finest implementation of AppleTalk he'd seen"; though
he probably meant to have added "excepting Apple's"  :-)

I just didn't want 8.2(4) to get a bad name based on something that
only one site, to my knowledge, has experienced.  The problem we
experienced is real, but its very limited in scope.

Allen Robel                         robelr@mythos.ucs.indiana.edu 
University Computing Services       ROBELR@IUJADE.BITNET 
Network Research & Planning         voice: (812)855-7171
Indiana University                  FAX:   (812)855-8299