[9fans] Re: etherelnk3.c

[Nigel Roles ngr@symbionics.co.uk]

>But how do those controllers compare to the Qlogic board or
>the Adaptec 294x?
>
The Symbios (i.e. NCR as was) 8751SP controller out-performs the Adaptec
294x series.
Also, it has full on-board auto termination, allowing any two busses
(wide/narrow, internal/
external) to be connected without mucking around. Adaptec's major
attraction in the
marketplace has been the availability of ASPI drivers under Win95. This
has now been fixed for
Symbios as well (in OSR 2.1), to the extent that the Adaptec tools work
with the Symbios
controller.

As for availability of fileserver drivers, the Symbios/NCR driver on my
website

(http://www.cotswold.demon.co.uk/plan9/dist/ncr/src)

is #ifdef'ed for use as either a CPU or an FS driver. Indeed, it is used
by myself, forsyth, and
perhaps others (who knows) as a file server driver. I think forsyth used
a word like 'brisk'  or 'snappy'
to describe the performance. You can use any controller from an original
NCR810 right through to a
Symbios 875 without change.

As for an Adaptec 294x driver, I'm still working on it periodically. May
be even today.