3Com 3XP chip - any good?

[Pace]

Wombat: I've got 2 networks - 1 at work and one at home. The work one is a 2 PC 10Mb on a 4port hub which I'm upgrading to beyond 4 PCs so I'm open to a new hub as well.

I'm fairly high ranking in the office though (Boss' son ) so I might get myself a switch and give them the hub

Also, does anyone know if network switches are similar to crossbar switches (electronics term). The reason I'm asking is that a friend told me that a switch is bad for games - because it gives only 2 PCs a link to each other at the same time. I know of the crossbar switch which links all PCs to each other PC which sounds good - but more expensive too.

Ta again, Paul.

[Taz]

I think your friend is speaking out of their rear ends. What would the point be of making a 24 port switch if only two PC's could communicate together? Switches are like hubs with brains. They are aware of what is connected to each port so when data comes in on one port, it only gets forwarded to the port that the target computer is connected to.

[Wombat]

Makes me wonder though. Switches do eliminate unnecessary traffic. So maybe "broadcast" type messages would be different.

Don't need to think about it too much though. Gaming runs under a client-server model, and there's independent connections for everybody.

[Greebe]

Pace your friend is full of it. Get a switch, some 905c's and be done with it.

[Guyver]

Hmmm..

3C905's, 3CR990-TX-95, Intel Pro 100 w/w/o mgmt (various rev's) - have used them all.

They all work well.

The Intel's seem to be a little more robust, but the 3Com's have always worked for me.

I am writing this on a system with a 3CR990-TX-95 - over a year old, never a problem.

Pick what you want, stay with what you like, and forget the rest.

Guyv

[Liquid Snake]

I dunno about 3Com cards, but me and my four Linksys LNE100TX cards are fine, along with a 8 port 10mbps hub in my DSL router.

[Pace]

Regarding the X-bar switch:

Yea - although it sounds good that in a 24 machine network, you could have a pair of 2 machines directly linked for ultrafast transfer before switching to another pair I think the delays in switching wouldn't be worth it.

I'll draw a pic too...

Paul.

[Pace]

Here's the pic (took a while, hehe, didn't spend it all on the pic though!):



In the top picture you see each PC links into a 4 way port (demux) and is therefore linked to each other PC (on the right).

The bottom pic shows a single line which switches between each connection.

So I presume the switch is the top picture but why the name switch? Is this another naming blunder along the lines of RAM and Flip-Flop ? I see that it will route the packet to any PC on a dedicated line but it's not really 'switching'.

And, if one of these does represent a switch, how does a hub work? Are they all on a single bus?

Paul.

Edit: Note that the drawing represents the same 4 PCs! The left side denotes transfer and the right denotes receive.

[This message has been edited by Pace (edited 05 November 2000).]