Websurfing with A500

[jjans]

Well it ain't pretty, but it is now possible.
After weeks of fighting with this old girl, I am finally
actually posting to amiga.org directly from my old A500.

I did it with a NULL Modem connection with Miami, and AWeb,
connected through a NT Server and RAS.

[jjans]

mr_a500 wrote:
Nice work jjans! You're the only other person I know of (besides me) who uses an A500 for web browsing. ("only in Canada, eh?...pity" - using quote from annoying tea commercial)

Why go through an NT server though? Why not just get a cheap external 56K modem (like I've got). Is the NT connection faster?

I wish I could get high-speed for my A500.

I went the NT Server route for 2 reasons.

1. Yes a modem would have been easier, but I wished to share my ISP cable/broadband connection from the Windows machine. I already had NT 4 Server, so no extra cost. No NIC card for my old A500, so Null Modem was the only solution.

2. The second reson was "because". The difficulty in getting it to actually work was bugging me. Plus I wanted a direct access to aminet from the amiga.

In regards to speed, I have only attained 38400 bps thus far using the built in serial.device. However, I have successfully connected using the BaudBandit.device, and so I may be able to squeeze 57600 out of her. I am going to have to shorten my serial cables to attain that, re-arrange the furniture too...

When I get a chance later today, I'll document everything I did for you guys that are interested.

[jjans]

OK I revamped my setup a bit to help others that may not have access to NT Server and Proxy 2.0 (both a pain to configure at times...)

1.    First you need a serial NULL Modem Cable as documented elsewhere on Aminet for example. Normal serial cables and NULL Modem box at Radio Shack works fine, as well as a couple of 25 pin to 9 pin adapters to fit on the box and the amiga's serial cable will be required as well. I first tested the connection with Terminus2.0 (Amiga) and Hyperterm (PC)with ZMODEM protocol.

2.     Next I downloaded Browsegate 3 and installed on the PC, pretty much with the default settings. I enabled DHCP and DNS, and found it worked fine, but you may assign staic IP's on the amiga if you wish.

3.     Next I downloaded MiamiDX, and I really wish I could remember where I found it, but I suppose you could just use Miami as is. I just found the MiamiDX easier to configure, and with more options.

4.    Ami2PC-TCP.lha on aminet works better as a null modem installed on the PC to use instead of the "connect 2 PC's" device on Windows (98 to XP). I found I had the best luck achieving successfull connection with this Null Modem device available here mdmhayes.inf . You can try both and see which one works out for you, as I found the first few attempts to connect pretty hit and miss.

5.    To set up the connection follow the instructions for Browsgate, that are quite good, and although they are aimed at the different Windows platforms, you can configure the Amiga by also following the Miami.guide at the same time. Note that Browsegate has a 15 day eval period, but is helpfull to get the idea. You can replace it later with Wingate later if you wish. As for myself, I am going to try Server 2000 with ISA Server next...

Hope this helps!

Note also that I am using a 68030/FPU A500 running OS 3.5.

[jjans]

Munchkin wrote:
Sounds interesting.

I've been thinking about hooking up my A500 to my A4k just for fun and I wonder what would be the best solution. My A4k is connected to my home network through ethernet so I need to use that as a gateway somehow. Is a parnet cable a possible solution?

I tried getting Miami to recognise the parnet.device, so I could try a TCP connection with another Amiga. No such luck however. This was qquite some time ago, and I cannot recall the exact error, but Miami certainly wasn't recognising parnet unfortunately. Perhaps a hack exists for parnet.device to use TCP/IP out there?

[jjans]

Mortifis wrote:
I registered here at amiga.org just to reply to this post.  You say that using a NULL modem connection to an NT system was the only solution to get broadband internet for your A500?  I beg to differ!  Why not just use a serial-to-CAT5 similar to this one

I am impressed. Certainly looks like an easier solution. I didn't mean to imply that the method I used was the only definitive way to share a PC's broadband with an A500. I simply wished to try to make it work with what I had in house.

It was kind of a fun challenge to get working. I am glad I started this this thread here on amiga.org, as I appreciate the different ideas mentioned in the replies.

I intend to check them out when I get a chance!