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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: outlawal2 on December 01, 2019, 01:15:25 AM

Title: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: outlawal2 on December 01, 2019, 01:15:25 AM: So I ordered a Gurunet Parallel nic for my A3000 from AOTL. As I understand it this is a Plipbox compatible Nic.
I open the package and there is one floppy (That I assume is an Amiga floppy) and the device.

Absolutely ZERO documentation. Nothing on the disk nothing in the box absolutely NOTHING.

Now I get it that this is hardware for a 30 year+ obsolete platform but WTF? No documentation of any kind seriously?
And of course on the AOTL site they provide a link to some guy that supposedly provides an amazingly detailed install procedure but in usual Amiga style the friggin link does not work.

So I tried going to the home page of said site and it works but the owner has apparently completely removed any mention of the Gurunet from his site.

Does anyone have any documentation on how to setup this thing? (And please refrain from the "Oh it's easy just set it up in Miami" or some such other non helpful statement as I (and pretty much anyone else) require step by step instructions as this is 30 year old tech.

Please advise
???
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: Matt_H on December 01, 2019, 02:51:19 AM: User documentation is becoming something of a lost art, not just in Amigaland but across the tech environment. I think this (https://github.com/cnvogelg/plipbox/blob/master/doc/src/amiga.md) will get you going on the software side.

I don't have a plipbox, but hardware-wise I think they do require external power from a USB power adapter.
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: ToddH on December 01, 2019, 03:16:22 AM: Here's the documentation that came with mine.
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: kolla on December 01, 2019, 04:34:50 PM: Have you tried inserting the floppy and see what’s on it?
How to use the plipbox depends on what networking stack you intend to use it with, so I am not sure what kind of documentation you expect.
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: outlawal2 on December 01, 2019, 11:32:35 PM: Thanks guys I think that may be what I needed
THANK YOU!

KOLLA:
What I was expecting was SOMETHING, anything, and the PDF provided by ToddH would have gone a LONG way toward making me happy.

It is nice to have some idea what you are supposed to do with a piece of hardware..

Thanks again guys
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: ToddH on December 02, 2019, 03:04:37 PM: You're welcome and happy to help. :)
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: 10MARC on December 03, 2019, 02:48:53 AM: Yep - All the docs are in the text files with the drivers. That is just the way of things, really. It is strangely difficult for anybody to include any paper docs now. I will have a Plipbox installation video and review up next week on my 10 Minute Amiga Retro Cast YouTube channel - just got one for my A1000 and A2000.
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: kolla on December 03, 2019, 09:05:32 PM: Quote from: Dynamic_Computing on December 03, 2019, 02:48:53 AM
Yep - All the docs are in the text files with the drivers. That is just the way of things, really. It is strangely difficult for anybody to include any paper docs now. I will have a Plipbox installation video and review up next week on my 10 Minute Amiga Retro Cast YouTube channel - just got one for my A1000 and A2000.
Just a heads up - the mac address of plipbox may be configured in firmware, there is a risk that two plipboxes will ship with same default mac address. Be sure to configure two different mac addresses on them if you intend to have your A1000 and A2000 online on the same LAN. I know at least Roadshow can do this, and Miami too if I recall correctly, unsure about AmiTCP.
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: outlawal2 on December 04, 2019, 06:27:48 PM: Good catch on that Kolla. (I was just going to respond back with that but you beat me to it.)

As I understand it you WILL have conflicts as they are all shipped with the same MAC address so be sure to change it in Roadshow if you are using more than one.
And thanks Dynamic I may check that out next week

I hope to have Roadshow and Plipbox installed and working by then but so far I have had no luck..
We shall see!
Title: Re: Gurunet (plipbox) Purchased from Amiga On The Lake
Post by: outlawal2 on December 05, 2019, 05:10:47 PM: OK I have successfully installed my Plipbox and Roadshow and have a working network connection to my Amiga!
I was really thinking that the Plipbox/Roadshow combination was really difficult to get up and running because I was having zero luck!

What I found is that they are not very difficult at all once I had some documentation, but the real issue I had is that the Plipbox requires an external power source using the same power cord as you would find on a Raspberry PI. Fine, I have several RPIs so I grabbed one and here is where the real issue showed up. Turns out the connector was slightly bent and now has a nasty short, so I plugged it in but was getting no power to the device. Once I replaced the cord with a good one simply follow the configuration instructions and all is well.

Next will be to download Ibrowse and SSL and see if I can get the browser working.

I did load a nice free program from Cloanto called Amiga Explorer and that is a great little tool similar to VNC in that it allows you to connect to the Amiga from a Windows box. Installed that and configured and now I can easily drag and drop files to my Amiga from my home network.

VERY nice..
Thanks for the help guys.