*BSD News Article 42715


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From: ggrant@crl.com (Gary E. Grant)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions
Subject: Re: Info Wanted: how many ethers in a box?
Date: 21 Feb 1995 00:41:06 -0800
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References: <LMJM.95Feb14140319@triumph.doc.ic.ac.uk>
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In article <LMJM.95Feb14140319@triumph.doc.ic.ac.uk>,
Lee M.J. McLoughlin <lmjm@triumph.doc.ic.ac.uk> wrote:
>I'm trying to help an academic site with a woefully small budget
>create a cheap router.  I'd like to make one out of a PC running a BSD. 
>However as they need to handle 5 networks (maybe in a pinch 4) I don't
>know if it is possible to put that many ethernet cards in a PC and not
>have severe IRQ problems.  It that is possible will BSD be happy with
>that many interfaces?
>
>To add to the problems they also need to route ethertalk.  Since CAP
>is available I'm hoping that I can use UAR for the job, again that
>presumes it can cope with a lot of interfaces.
> 
>If anyone can offer any advice I would greatly appreciate it.
> 
>        Lee
I have seen 4 port Ethernet cars for the PCI bus for about $300.00
An Asus 486 PCI Motherboard costs about $200.00. Cheapest solution that
I could come up with for your problem domain..

The princle problem that you would have in an ISA box is getting all of 
the IRQs   you could use 5,9,10,12,15 for Ethernet card and the others 
for required functions ...