ELBOX New Spider device

[Piru]

Spider is not yet available- we hope to get a scheduled Elbox order in the next few weeks.

So are these cards still rebadged NEC 720101 USB cards with a modified PCI ID? (They sell for $7 or so)
Does this particular driver erase RDB if you're unlucky?

[Piru]

A bit like MorphOS is a modified OS3.1

If you're trying to find as bad analogy as you can you've succeeded.

The only way that'd work would be if Elbox would have studied some existing NEC USB card and would have created their own version with similar functionality, but with improved features. I'm afraid the Elbox contribution to the HW is the printed sticker.

Only if you're a pirate.

If only. Unfortunately AmigaOS has no memory protection, and as such the driver cannot tell a difference between a pirate and some application trashing innocent memory.

[Piru]

@Piru
Harry, I am not sure- Ill let you know if we can get them in stock.  I think the third batch of cards we had a few years ago were another brand though, if I remember correctly.  I know the Spider in my A1200 cosmetically looks very different to the later Spider, in terms of layout and components.

Interesting. Do those card revisions have the same PCI ID?

Which actually reminds me: You could easily create a patch to the pci.library so that it'd report any NEC USB card as having the same PCI ID as Spider 2. Assuming the chipset is the correct one it'd work. This way the spider driver would stay untouched and RDB destruction wouldn't happen either.

[Piru]

I'd rather see Piru back up his statement by producing evidence that such code exists in the latest drivers.

Which statement is that?

[Piru]

I know the difference between "suggesting" and "stating"

Well it looked like as if you wouldn't have. Thanks for setting the record straight.

[Piru]

Has it been confirmed that it no longer has the RDB code in it?

There's no way to know unless if someone reverse engineers the code. At least in earlier driver versions Elbox employed encryption methods to hide the code from simple disassembly dumping (hence elboxdecrypt).

I might take a look if I find some spare time.

[Piru]

So, can we take that as "there is no RDB trashing code in Elbox's drivers that Piru knows about and he just hates to think of them selling rebadged USB cards to Mediator owners"?

More like "This vendor has placed malicious code in their driver before, publicly denied any wrongdoing rather than apologizing, and thus cannot be trusted unless any software from them is manually checked against such code."

[Piru]

Does this mean that any USB card using the NEC 720101 chipset will work?

No. Elbox has locked the driver to this "Spider" card. There's no reason why it wouldn't work though, other than this artificial lock-in.

If so, I found USB cards with this chipset for even less at $4.98!

I'm afraid you have to buy the Spider II. It's about $77. You get a nice yellow Elbox Spider II sticker though!

[Piru]

If you're attempting to pick holes in someone else's grammar

I wasn't.