[Simh] Data switches and terminal multiplexers

[William Pechter]

 > Message: 2
 > Date: Thu, 12 Nov 2015 15:15:02 -0500
 > From: Phil Budne <phil at ultimate.com>
 > To: simh at trailing-edge.com
 > Subject: Re: [Simh] terminal multiplexers
 > Message-ID: <201511122015.tACKF2wW080567 at ultimate.com>
 > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
 >
 > Al Kossow wrote:
 > > On 11/12/15 5:25 AM, Patrick Finnegan wrote:
 > >> DEC's DECserver, Xyplex Maxserver, Annex terminal servers, and 
Xylogics
 >
 > Didn't Xylogics buy the Annex from Encore?

Not sure where they got it from but the Annex went to Nortel.
 >
 > > UB was XNS ....
 >
 > Boston University had a terminal network that ran over CATV wiring.
 > I'm not sure I ever knew what protocols were being used for "native"
 > services. We also wired up the UB boxes via parallel port to VAXen and
 > ran TCP/IP between VAXen (4.2BSD and VMS).
 >
 > An even earlier generation of "terminal network" was the Gandalf switch.
 >

Yup and the Micom switch was it's competitor.  Used 'em at DEC before
they had the LAT in our office.

As far as the terminal services over cable head end.  Sytek had
LocalNet20 boxes which went to the serial ports on pc's and VT100's at
Fort Monmouth in New Jersey as part of the CASPR project.

I found this on line:

http://www.historyofcomputercommunications.info/Book/7/7.16-Sytek-BroadbandNetworkNeedingCash.html

The book seems to have a lot of good stuff there...

In February 1981, Sytek began shipping their comparatively inexpensive 
two-port broadband terminal server: LocalNet 20. A direct consequence of 
its Lincoln Lab development contract, two LocalNet 20s, costing a total 
of $2,500, made a network.

Although both Sytek and UB, with its NUI-1, positioned their products as
terminal servers, Sytek’s customers tended to be those wanting to build
campus-wide networks whereas UB’s wanted departmental networks. In 
practice,
Sytek and UB sold to any customer without thought of niches or market
segmentation, for the lack of buying customers dwarfed the annoyances of
competition, a condition soon to be exacerbated by an onslaught of 
companies
offering every imaginable means of interconnecting computers and 
peripherals.

In having diverted resources to LocalNet 20, consulting revenues 
contracted,
and Sytek management had little choice but to raise capital. They began
talking to venture capitalists.