How has PARNET worked for you?

[Amiduffer]

Hi guys. Due to [color=ff0000]leirbag28[/color][/i][/u] offering me his old A3000, I'm going to have [color=008000]2[/color][/b][/u] Amiga's at the same time, which I've never had before. Sold A1000 to buy A500, sold that to buy A2000, sold that to buy A1200, etc. Looking around the internet, I've seen some pages talking about Parnet and having one amiga slaved to the other. I was wondering, if any of you have used it, or something better, what you would recomend? Would this help me get around my 1200 IDE problems? :-o

[glitch]

Hi,

    What IDE problems are you having?  I haven't used ParNET/ParNFS in years myself.  I just remember it worked well for me when I had to use it.  It's worth a look!

-G

[Amiduffer]

glitch wrote:
Hi,
    What IDE problems are you having?  I haven'y used ParNET/ParNFS in years myself.  I just remember it worked well for me when I had to use it.  It's worth a look!

-G

If you attach a HD, a most horrible high pitch squeal comes out of the motherboard.

The consensus of the techs around was that the IDE interface was fried. :flame:

[glitch]

Holy crap!

[ChaosLord]

I have used Parnet for around 15 years.
It works great.

But iirc the max transfer speed is around 40K bytes per second.

[orange]

It has worked for a few days for me and then just stopped, seems to have killed my parallel port. printer still works though. serial should be much safer, though a LOT slower.

if you really need it then maybe magplip (IIRC) would be a better solution in case you might want TCPIP some day.

[Amiga4k]

Orange,
 Was that a hacked Parallel cable you were using?  The cable hack might have a cold solder joint or bad insulation wrap.

You correctly pointed out a problem with ParNet, it does not play well with the serial devices, as the serial port uses the SEL line during RI (ring indicate).

PS: likes the other avatar :-D

[odin]

I used ParNET many eons ago to tie a CDTV to an A1200. Worked flawlessly but it was SLOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooOOOOOOoW (Most likely even a bit slower than that).

[benJamin]

Once upon a time, I used to take my 1200 with me on flights down south.

I sat it on top of my old 500, both plugged into the same 1084S, parallel linked using ProNET.

First, I coppied all the files off my 100Mb SCSI, then swapped 'The Party Mix' for the 520 (?) CD Drive and used it as my 1200's CD drive.

In short, using the network to control both computers with the one mouse and keyboard was pretty quick.

File copying, however, is a matter of 'set and forget', or maybe just come back in the time it takes to boot a 386 into Windex 3.11.  :-D


benJamin

"Today, I am a comedian,
 Tomorrow, I will be labeled a dissident."
(New anti-terror laws)

[number6]

@Amiduffer

Hi,

I have used Parnet since the early days of the A500. Proper cable is key to success and
this is well documented. Installing one classic Amiga as "host" and a second classic Amiga
as "client" is truly simple. Used in conjunction with Dopus, I found it to be a joy.

Info on parnet:
http://www.graner.net/parbench.htm
Also a good read here by a satisfied customer:
http://www.scuzz.org.uk

@thread

I understand the comments concerning speed, but I must say that reliability is always my
chief concern. It succeeded for me in that category 100%.

Best Wishes,
#6

[huronking]

I horded a genuine Laplink parallel cable back in 1995 and never had any trouble...

Worked real well, although I havent used it in probably 5 years. I cant see any reason for you not to have success as long as you have a good cable with the right pinout.

[Amiduffer]

Thanks for all the advice everyone. I wish I would have found this site years ago. I could have saved myself quite a bit of agravation.

In the early days, I had the old GEnie BBS, Southern Maine Amiga Users Group, and the Store in Rockland Maine to turn to for help. Now, it's you guys.

My recent "adventures" with my 1200 would probably make a decent story, although I don't see any posts to tell your hair-pulling stories.  :shocked: