*BSD News Article 37740


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From: iialan@iifeak.swan.ac.uk (Alan Cox)
Subject: Re: 16550 detection
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References: <MICHAELV.94Oct31211019@MindBender.HeadCandy.com> <TYTSO.94Nov1182557@dcl.mit.edu> <199411032154.NAA12270@exit.com>
Date: Wed, 9 Nov 1994 20:20:58 GMT
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In article <199411032154.NAA12270@exit.com> fmayhar@netcom.com writes:
>very useful.  You may say that such speeds are unrealistic, but with
>v.34 and compression, throughputs of 115200 should become fairly common
>on compressible data, and with ISDN you need the higher rates, since
>you'll be running at up to 128kbps uncompressed.  Without that 1024-byte

With ISDN you need something better than a UART. You are normally looking
at ethernet like block I/O interfaces.

>Well, maybe.  But you're expecting to use it at low data rates interactively.
>I'm expecting to use it at much higher rates, and/or as a part of a network.
>Sure, large FIFOs are overkill at 38400 bps, but at 57600 bps (the speed
>I use at the moment) and better those FIFOs begin to look more like buffers
>on a networking interface card.  Indispensable.

Its worth noticing high bandwidth 64 channel serial boards tend to run on
a timer empty of the queue every clock tick not on anything more complex.
With high data rates its simply not worth the hassle of handling bytes as
they arrive.

>I disagree.  At the data rates I mean to use, the large FIFO and DMA
>capability will mean a *greatly* reduced load on an already overtaxed
>CPU.  At $10 for a single-port card (at Computer City a couple of

DMA is of dubious value (can anyone say 'CACHE'). For the kind of things
a fast port is using block I/O will be faster until you get to extreme
(Mbits/second) speeds. 

Alan
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 // Alan Cox  //  iialan@www.linux.org.uk   //  GW4PTS@GB7SWN.#45.GBR.EU  //
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