[Gllug] Genuine DEC Tulips?

[Per Gregers Bilse]

Does anybody know where to find fast ethernet cards using (more or less)
genuine DEC Tulip chips, ie similar/identical to the DEC 21140 series
(I guess only the 21143 is relevant)?

There are several pseudo-clones, but more often than not they only mimic
things like register interface and general functionality, they are not
in any way genuine DEC Tulips, and don't have the throughput of the
real thing.  A bit like putting a six-speed gearbox in your favourite
micromobile and saying "Oh yes, it's just like a Ferrari".

It may seem a smallish thing these days, but I've seen several current
day FE chips hardly getting above 60Mbps even in a full duplex setting.
The problem is too cheap chip internals, they simply can't keep up with
the housekeeping required to saturate the pipe, while five years ago I was
hitting the ethernet bend at some 80Mbps using DEC21143 cards (and with
negligible CPU load).

(VeriSign petition signed, needless to say.)

Thanks, cheers,

  -- Per


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