Here is my quandry, I have several Macs i want to network with my DSL. My current configuration is such that I have a 233 iMac (9.2.2), a clamshell iBook(x.2.8), a 15" FP iMac(x.2.8), a Quadra 950 (8.1), a IIsi (7.x), a LC 475 (8.1-ish), and plans to add more stuff over time. I am using a 10BaseT hub (all I have) and an Airport (for the Fp iMac and the iBook). The DSl assigns IP addresses via DCHP. The Airport uplinks to the router which uplinks to the DSL.
The IP address assignment is sometimes a little squirrely. I have a copy of Apple Share IP 6.1. I want to install this on my 233 iMac, but also thought of taking this machine back (has a 120Gigger) to OS X.2.8 highest I have right now).
Reccomendations? (the FP iMac is my wife's so me-no-touchee)
Would like to put this on the Quadra, but from the box, i can see I need 8.6. I am not ready to upgrade the CPU on the Quadra just yet, so it is running 8.1
--DDTM
...did not prview before posting... That should read ( X.2.8 )
--DDTM
Not exactly sure what your question is, but from your list the only thing I see missing is a router, unless the AirPort you mention is one of the newer models with two ethernet ports. If that's taken care of, then you should have a decently working network. Is everything working?
One thing that isn't terribly clear is where you say the DSL is serving DHCP; I'm assuming that's your DSL modem. Does that have a router function built in? Many do -- mine at home does, and also has 802.11g, which allows me to surf with my PB from just about anywhere in the house. If the router is properly configured it will hand out all the info needed to connect up to 254(?) machines to the Internet, provided you've got enough ethernet hubs/switches and ports.
If DHCP is squirrely, one way around it is to not use it for those that don't play well. If all the machines are stationary you could just hard code the IP addresses into them, and maybe leave a range of IP's for portables or the occasional new machine you stick on the network temporarily. For manually configured IP you'd also have to hard code the subnet mask, the router address, and any DNS addresses, but it's a surefire way around DHCP problems. I avoided DHCP with Macs until about OS 9; before that Mac TCP/IP just didn't play well with DHCP. The easy way to hard code the IP's is to have your router at x.x.x.1 (most use that address by default) and assign subsequent numbers to the other machines. Most Class C networks will use something like 192.168.1.x, with a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. Check one of your Macs to see what address range your DHCP has used and what address your router has, then build on that.
What's an "FP iMac?"
Not worth the hassle IMO unless you've got a more than several clients connected at once.
dan k
I have thought about hard-coding the IP stuff in, but thgought that was not the best (networking is still new to me).
Sorry about being unclear on the network hardware. I have a DSL modem. Connected to that is an 8-port 10BaseT router. Connected to that is an Airport extreme with a printer via USB. The airport's uplink port is connected to the router, whose uplink is connected to the DSL. The stationary Macs are all connected to the router except the FP iMac (FP is flatpanel).
I will dick around with these this weekend and see if it resolves that 'glitch' I sometime experience.
--DDTM
I am planning to store audio files on the iMac's 120G drive. I plan to use it to work with thing sI might do on my Quadra and on my iBook. The other 68k Macs may periodically connect to it for access to some files and games (old 68k games and some arcade emulation stuff - not the new high tech networked interactive stuff) and such.
There is a real possibility that I could have as many as three machines connected at once. I thought ASIP would play nicer than simply going through Network Neighborhood. I would really like to put this on the Quadra (CPU upgrade not withstanding) as I will be doing some basic AV stuff here (Video Vision and Pro Audio Spectrum stuff). For now I thought the iMac would work better.
--DDTM
File sharing is really pretty light-duty stuff. And I would agree that ASIP is a bit of overkill for just a handful of computers like that -- it's designed for lots of concurrent connections moving lots of files or very large files. For just a few machines anything running OS X could match or beat ASIP's capabilities. The one shortcoming of OS X as compared to ASIP is being able to assign sharing to specific folders, creating sharepoints. But there is a shareware doodad called Sharepoints — what else! — that will help with that.
I am the volunteer sysadmin for our church's office, and we use an old beige 233MHz G3 running 10.2.8 and Sharepoints to serve to the office staff... about 15 users. It works great. OS X has a limit of 10 concurrent users, but that rarely is a problem. You could upgrade your 233 iMac to OS X and set up Sharepoints on it, and it'd still have horsepower to spare for whatever else the family throws at it. Or if you're averse to that, beige G3 desktops can be had for very little these days, and take up very little space. Or even if that's too much for right now, just the native file sharing on the Quadra (with IP sharing turned on, of course) would work pretty well. The only problem there might be getting enough SCSI disk space to do what you want. That's one thing I like about the old 68040 Performas (like the 630); they have built-in ATA support, so you can stick any size drive you can afford into it. The old 040 machines will run AppleShare 4 just dandy, or if that's not a possibility, native file sharing works in a pinch.
Hey, here's one other alternative for you; since you've already got a copy of ASIP, track down an old 7200 (or maybe 7300 or 7500), drop an ATA adapter card in it, and you could have hundreds of gigabytes shared.
Or... nah... I'd better stop for now. Oh, the possibilities!
I though about simple filesharing, but I know some of the files I will be working with will be large (300MB-500MB). Problem is not all of the machines I have will be runing X, in fact, I would be happy to stay Classic for some of the machines. My 233 alway ran better under 9.2.2, for example (yes, I know why). At this point, I kind of am leaning towards running this off of my 233 iMac (until I can upgrade the Quadra's CPU). I just was unsure of if this was the best route. If I do not put ASIP on there, then I will probally go back to X.2.8. My problem with that was the voice recognition sucks.
I do plan to add a ton of space to the Quadra, but that will be gradual, and as discussed on other threads, will most likely include usage of SCSI-IDE adapters to help me break the 100G thresh hold (more a money issue than anything at this point).
The version of ASIP I have is 6 and I may get a 8500 or better, but not until March at the earliest. Besides, I must clean out the garage before my wife will allow me to bring anything more in. I have a few boxed odds and ends I need to rediscover as well.
--DDTM
I figure my setup might be of interest to you. I use 5 different filesharing servers on my server.
* Built-in Appleshare - IP + AppleTalk (used for basic stuff like supplying mp3s to local Macs)
* Timbuktu (for waay fast transfers locally of large files)
* NetPresenz (for ftp access)
* Carracho (online, external filesharing)
* Hotline (v1.23, online, serves same files as Carracho, but for pre-OS9 clients)
Here's my filesharing server's hardware setup:
PM9500/225mHz/96MB/9.2.2
SCSI storage on ATTO UW cards
* 3 x 23GB Seagate Elites
* 3 x 47GB Elites
10/100 RealTek NIC
FW and display cards
It runs 24/7/365 and has been very reliable, though recently I've been having problems with the Carracho server locking up (though filesharing continues to work, strange that.)
AppleShare is very slow compared to TB2, over a totally 100/BT network I get file transfer rates of just under 3MB/s using TB2, 3 or 4 times the speed of using Apple file sharing (IP) or even ASIP 6.3.x.
Built-in OS 9 IP filesharing is fine for playing MP3s to one or two clients, but any more at once is stutter city. This is one application where OSX would be a much better choice than anything under a classic MacOS. X just does multiple things at once sooo much better.
As for you HW, that iMac will run X.3.x very nicely. You can even bump up its speed for free, I jumpered both my 233 Bondis to 300mHz without any trouble.
dan k
For all hardwired machines, hardcode the IP and subnet within the valid range and for the roamers (airport cards and such), allow a DCHP to do its stuff (in a range that excludes the hardwired ones...
For the OS X capable machines, I should run OS X. For the 68K based ones, ASIP is not a bad idea, even if a bit much for the few machines I have. Given that I do expect to add a good deal of storage and larger files to the Quadra (as well a a Telecast setup), ASIP would probably do okay in the long run.
Thanks - my next for the Quadra is to setup the drive system, acquire the Telecast components, and finish the Eudimorphidon Challenge Card, then look into a CPU upgrade.
--DDTM
If you've got a copy of ASIP, that'd make a great all-around server for all the machines on your network. One thing with ASIP though is that it does a great job of sharing files on the network -- even big files -- but it doesn't share resouces on the local machine very well at all. It likes to be the only app running on the machine. Period. I have an ASIP 6.3 machine running on a dual G4/500, and gave up trying to run Retrospect on it a long time ago. Now Retrospect runs on its own beige G3, and everybody's happy. Best thing to do is just let ASIP have its way and leave it all by its lonesome on a machine that doesn't do anything else.
On the other hand, any machine running OS X would do file sharing just as well as ASIP could, if not better, and running other apps would hardly bother it at all. In fact, if you used your wife's flat panel (I figured out what FP means
) as the file server, I doubt she'd even notice. It already has OS X on it... all you'd need to do is make sure you had enough disk space attached to it.
As for your IP addressing scheme, that sounds good; hard code the IP's for everybody but the portables. The file server (or any server) should be hard coded.
I'll second the comment that ASIP likes to have a machine all to itself. If you don't need to run other software in the iMac, go for it. A 7100/80 with ASIP 6.1 works well for me as a home file server.
OS X as a server is not particularly friendly to older Macs, which may affect the 68k Macs. You can make it work, but it may be a hassle compared with an AppleShare server which just works out of the box.
In either case, that 120G volume may be too big for the older clients. If you have the opportunity to partition the drive, make a smaller volume (less than 2G?) for older Macs to share.
The Quadra 950 running an older AppleShare server sounds like a nice solution, but the beast draws a lot of power...
Okay, I decided to take my iMac (Rev. A) back up to X.2.8. I expect to be picking up a few PowerMacs early next year and wil most likely keep one as a dedicated ASIP server. My Quadra, well, that is a longer tale. Suffice it to say, I will be carting the whole setup out to my workbench by January so that I can work on the updrades and the Eudimorphodon Challenge Card. So far, it has a PAS 16 set up, a VVS setup and two FWB Jakhammers. I still need to build the chasis for the case extender... Worst case scenario, it will end up running 8.1 indefinetely, best case... (I'll keep that under my hat until I can finish the Eudi card).
--DDTM