From: mitton@dave.enet.dec.com (Dave Mitton)
Subject: Re: Still looking for DECnet objects for 'Bow + MSDOS + DECnet
Keywords: and still ticking
Reply-To: mitton@dave.enet.dec.com (Dave Mitton)
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation, Littleton MA
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 19:49:40 GMT


In article <5OCT199220072401@nereid.sunquest.com>, spg@nereid.sunquest.com (Steve Gibbons) writes:
>From: spg@nereid.sunquest.com (Steve Gibbons)
>Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro
>Subject: Re: Still looking for DECnet objects for 'Bow + MSDOS + DECnet
>Date: 6 Oct 92 03:07:00 GMT
>
>In article <1992Sep29.211132.24273@nntpd.lkg.dec.com>, mitton@dave.enet.dec.com (Dave Mitton) writes...
>#In article <28SEP199222223884@nereid.sunquest.com>, spg@nereid.sunquest.com (Steve Gibbons) writes:
>#>In article <Bv7420.7xn@news.cso.uiuc.edu>, schwartz@feh.scs.uiuc.edu (Dwight A. Schwartz) writes...
>#>#What networking options were/are available for the Rainbow?  It would appear
>#>#from the post that Rainbows _can_ be connected to a DECnet, so, more 
>#>#specifically, is there any hardware/software which would allow me to connect 
>#>#a Rainbow directly to a TCP/IP network? (e.g. thin cable ethernet card, etc.).
># 
>#	Digital never produced an Ethernet card for the Rainbow.  We
>#evaluated a 3rd party card by an outfit called Univation, but never supported
>#it.  Since there wasn't any vacant option spaces left, the card was designed
>#to sandwich under the disk controller AND tap into the FP coprocessor option.
>#Unfortunately this vastly overloaded the power supply (a marginal design to
>#be begin with) and it was not unusual for a burst of transmissions to cause
>#the Rainbow to crash.  There were other problems as well.
>
>Was there an overload situation on a diskless workstation?  or only when a
>hard-drive was installed?

	Primarily the hard drive.  In fact Univation suggested another kludge
to get the hard drive power off a seperate supply to work around this issue.
But most people that wanted network access tended to have full boat systems
to begin with.  And there were other reliability problems.

>
>#	There was a Corvus Omninet card for the Rainbow.
>
>More, tell us more...

	What's there to say?  How many people do you know that run Omninet
today?  Is Corvus still in business??

>#>DECnet-DOS was a pre-cursor to Pathworks for DOS.  I've only tested it with 
>#>RS232 connections, since I haven't been able to scrounge up an ethernet card
>#>for the Rainbow (yet.)  One thing to consider (if you can obtain the software)
>#>is that it's only an end-node license, you'll need to have a router in the
>#>works somewhere, unless your net only consists of two end-nodes.
>#>
>#>Version 1.1 is/was _very basic_ in the clients/servers that were provided.
># 
>#	I think, Version 1.2 was the last version of DECnet-Rainbow released.
>#It provided all of the standard DECnet peer-to-peer utilities still in
>#PATHWORKS for DOS today (including DECnet sockets).
>
>So, where can one obtain V1.2 of DECnet/DOS for the 'Bow?  ...and where can one
>obtain the "programmers' kit?"  Has DEC decided that the Rainbow is "dead"
>enough (from a marketing POF) to release this stuff to the PD, yet?
>
>--
>Steve (SPG6) spg@sunquest.com

        I don't know if DECnet-Rainbow was released PD or not.  I doubt it. I
also don't know if the SSB does archival software sales. You should check with
the DECUS PC SIG or the Rainbow Users Group (RUG) that act as Rainbow support
groups.  I'm sick/dumb/pack-rat enough to have this lying around:

---------
From:	<Dn-RB product mgr>   26-JUN-1987 13:38:47.78
To:	<list of people>,MITTON
Subj:	Retirement of DECnet-Rainbow (and Rainbow itself.)

The calendar for the retirement of the Rainbow looks like this:

Announcement to Field	Feb 9 1987
Announcement to Customers April 30 1987 (DECUS)
PAC Approval		Jan 14 1987
Last Order Date		June 30 1987
Last Ship Date		December 30 1987
Last Software Ship Date 
(including DECnet-Rainbow) December 30 1988
Last Software Support Contract December 30 1989
Maintenance for S/W ends December 1989
---------

        This was eons ago on the PC scale of life.  Digital never directly
released a version of DOS V3.x for the 'bow.  It was done via a 3rd party.

	Dave (and my VAXmate is used as a terminal).

Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro