Category Archives: Networking

Emulating EtherLink

Posted on January 31, 2020 by Michal Necasek

Spurred by the discovery of a pre-release OS/2 NetWare Requester from early 1988 with a very thin selection of drivers, several months ago I decided to write emulation of the classic 3Com 10Mbps Ethernet 3C501 card, also known as EtherLink. … Continue reading →

Posted in 3Com, Networking, PC hardware, PC history, Virtualization | 33 Comments

1987 Networking: ELS NetWare 286 Level I 2.0a

Posted on January 24, 2020 by Michal Necasek

A rare find recently turned up: NetWare from 1987, specifically the low-end ELS variant of NetWare 286 version 2.0a (ELS may be claimed to mean Entry Level System or maybe Entry Level Server, but at least originally it stood for … Continue reading →

Posted in 286, 3Com, Kryoflux, NetWare, Networking | 29 Comments

DOS Wireless Networking, Continued

Posted on December 11, 2019 by Michal Necasek

As I recently mentioned, wireless networking is extra difficult when the access point reboots itself at the slightest hint of heavier traffic. The faulty TP-Link router was temporarily replaced with a Netgear WG602 of similar vintage. The Netgear has been … Continue reading →

Posted in DOS, Networking, NFS, TCP/IP, Wireless | 3 Comments

Wireless Networking in DOS

Posted on December 2, 2019 by Michal Necasek

Wireless networking has a long history, longer than most people realize. NCR’s WaveLAN was available in 1990 and of course supported DOS. But WaveLAN was only the precursor to IEEE 802.11 and it is completely incompatible with IEEE-standard networking equipment. … Continue reading →

Posted in DOS, Networking, Wireless | 20 Comments

Synology Strikes Again

Posted on October 10, 2019 by Michal Necasek

Three years ago I ran into a problem with a Synology DSM update preventing vintage SMB clients from connecting to my NAS. Now I ran into a similar but different problem. The symptom was DOS and (at least old) OS/2 … Continue reading →

Posted in LAN Manager, Networking, Software Hacks | Leave a comment

PC-NFS 3.0.1

Posted on July 24, 2019 by Michal Necasek

Between a search engine and a friend, the search for PC-NFS 3.0 yielded a set of seven 360K floppy images of Sun PC-NFS 3.0.1. Hooray for the Internet, and thank you! Judging by the timestamps, PC-NFS 3.0.1 was finalized in … Continue reading →

Posted in Networking, NFS, PC history | 9 Comments

PC-NFS 3.0 Anyone?

Posted on July 14, 2019 by Michal Necasek

I’m looking for Sun’s PC-NFS 3.0 (circa 1989), or ideally even older PC-NFS version. The ultimate goal is to get the oldest surviving x86 NFS client going in a VM; it is almost certain that the first such product was … Continue reading →

Posted in Networking, NFS, PC history | 5 Comments

1988 Networking: 386 XENIX

Posted on June 20, 2019 by Michal Necasek

With the 3Com 3C501 EtherLink emulation in hand, I thought I’d see if it works with the SCO TCP/IP stack for SCO XENIX/UNIX. That particular stack, which actually consists of separate STREAMS and a TCP/IP packages, comes with whopping two … Continue reading →

Posted in 3Com, Networking, PC hardware, SCO, TCP/IP, Virtualization | 11 Comments

1988 Networking: NetWare OS/2 Requester

Posted on May 10, 2019 by Michal Necasek

A while ago, the question of antique NetWare OS/2 requesters came up. The oldest known surviving NetWare OS/2 Requester is version 1.2, which is designed to work with OS/2 1.2. There are clear mentions of older requesters supporting OS/2 1.1 … Continue reading →

Posted in NetWare, Networking, OS/2, PC history, Virtualization | 16 Comments

NetWare 2.x Notes

Posted on May 9, 2019 by Michal Necasek

Novell NetWare has quite a long history, but the older parts of it are now almost completely lost. In the mid-1980s, Novell offered Advanced NetWare, NetWare ELS, NetWare SFT, and other members of the NetWare 286 family. With the partial … Continue reading →

Posted in NetWare, Networking, PC history | 14 Comments