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From: thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.att
Subject: Re: TCP/IP over Starlan
Message-ID: <26490@cup.portal.com>
Date: 1 Feb 90 20:38:32 GMT
References: <1609@speedy.mcnc.org> <195@glisten.UUCP>
Distribution: usa
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 35

mike@glisten.UUCP (Michael Wendel) in <195@glisten.UUCP> mentions:

	AT&T has announced Ethernet compatability (IEEE 802.3) with its 
	Starlan 10 product. I have AT&T literature on this product offering.
	It is available directly from AT&T. They provide a toll free number
	for more information:  1-800-247-1212.

The original 1Mbit/sec StarLAN is also 802.3 compatible; more specifically,
ANSI/IEEE 802.3e-1988, Type 1BASE5.

The "new" StarLAN-10 is Type 10BASE5.

The syntax of those "Type" designations is:

	<Mbits/second> {BASEband or BROADband} <x 100 meters>

IEEE 802.3 (presently) permits any of coax, broadband, twisted-pair, and
fiber-optic technologies.

That compliance to IEEE 802.3 does NOT imply that one can "just" plug and
play different vendors' products.  Some of the 8-10 StarLAN vendors' products
are (allegedly) not directly compatible (this comment from "LANS: Applications
of IEEE/ANSI 802 Standards", Madron, Wiley Books, ISBN 0-471-62049-1).

'Bout the only "real" thing in common with all the IEEE 802.3 compliant
networks is "CSMA/CD" (Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Detection);
witness DECNet's compatibility to StarLAN.

As someone else once said:

"The nice thing about standards is there are so many from which to choose."  :-
)


Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]