Ethernet over FireWire: How?

Olivier Nicole on at cs.ait.ac.th
Mon May 16 19:42:57 PDT 2005


Hi Rob,

> Can someone give me a layman's answer to how I can
> use the firewire as the second ethernet card?
> The backside of the computer has a socket labeled
> '1394', but this is not a RJ-45 connector. Do I
> need a converter cable from firewire to RJ-45?
 
I'd say that "Ethernet over Firewire" is really what it says it is,
Ethernet is encapsulated in Firewire, so at the other end you also
need to attach to a "Ethernet over Firewire" device.

Beside, Firewire is much slower than Ethernet I guess.

If you build a router for your lab, I'd recommend that you buy proper
Ethernet cards, they will prove much more reliable (last longer,
deliver higher bandwidth, attach nicely to some weird Ethernet
switches...) than cheap solution like "over Firewire". Is it worth
saving 50$ on a machine that is supposed to handle a good share of
your lab infrastructure?

Olivier


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