Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mcvax!enea!tut!santra!news
From: news@santra.UUCP (news)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Sun 386i (Road Runner) AT-bus - advice wanted
Message-ID: <13155@santra.UUCP>
Date: 24 May 88 22:42:39 GMT
Reply-To: atk@hutcs.hut.fi, atk@finhutcs.bitnet
Organization: Helsinki University of Technology
Lines: 28

I have heard the following (unconfirmed) about the RR AT-bus:

1. You cannot access it from the Sun OS.

2. Sun will not supply drivers for any add-on boards.

Is 1. true or simply a missinterpretation of 2.?
Has anyone acctually used a PC-bus add-on board (such as an intelligent
I/O board, e.g. IBM RIC) with the RR?
Any problems (SW or HW)?

We are planning to use the Definicon Inc. Transputer boards and SW
development kit running on MS-DOS with the RR.

1. Can we down-load applications from the development system to the board
   on the AT-bus? If so, do we have to write our own driver? If not, why not?

2. Can we interface an application running under MS-DOS-emulation with the
   Transputer board without writing lots of driver SW?

3. Can we do the same with an application running on Sun OS? Obviously we
   need to write our own driver here? Can there be some reason why this
   should not be possible at all?

Any info on HW and SW compatibility of the AT-bus and especially real-life
experience and/or references would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance, Arto Karila