X-Surf II, what a scam...

[ShadesOfGrey]

Well, there is the point Floid made.  Have you considered the possibility that some of this "rip off pricing" has been to genereate R&D funds for things like the KickFlash, Delfina Flipper, and the Catweasel Mk3?

Think of it this way.  Inititially the $120 price tag is intended to cover all costs (R&D, QA, manufacturing, support)  to produce the board, plus a small profit.  After a while, Jens recoups his R&D on the card itself and the demand is sufficient that he can produce card in larger lots and reduce manfucaturing costs (though manufacturing will probaly go up as the market it saturated).  He could slash the price of the card and pass the savings on to the consumer...  But his consumers keep pestering him for a PCI version of his Catweasel card.  The problem is, he has no where near the money it would take for the R&D of such a card...  So what is he to do, keep the price of the Catweasel at $120 and use the funds it generates to work on the Catweasel Mk3.  As an offshoot, the Flipper interface designed for the Catweasel can now be incorporated into other products (i.e Delfina Flipper), effectively reducing their cost.

Oh and one last thought.  Jens isn't the only one that sets the price of his products.  You have to consider the retail markup as well.  Take for example the DICE C compiler...  It was released as freeware a while back, but at least one retailer has it listed for $90 on their site.  Granted, they probably spent quite a bit for it when it was still a commercial product.  But can you really justify that price for media and a bound manual?

[patrik]

@Ilwrath:

What results do you get if you benchmark it with ttcp and what cpucard is your amiga equipped with?.. and just for the sake of asking, have you tried it with AmiTCP/Genesis?

Amiga version of ttcp
Windows version of ttcp
Sourcecode for ttcp


/Patrik

[Lemmink]

Well maybe I`m a strange guy, but when I found out the X-Suft was a two piece card, the only thought that came to my mind was: "clever idea".
I got it new for the full price and didn`t see any reason for complain.

[Acill]

Wow you all slammed me hard here. I guess what I am saying is its hard to see how that interface can cost $115. The ISA cards are crap and cheap. I would say he would have made a better deal if he just sold the adapter with a list of support cards for like $75 or something.

Further up someone mentioned it was better to sell to a lot of users for $5 then to a few for $20. I agree. I think if he sold that card for $75 a lot more people with big box amiga computer would get one. The price alone is what kept me from getting one back when I first saw it.

I got a Mediator and a Mirage tower for $500. Now one may think crap what a lot of money, but when I looked at what I could add to it its a better deal.

I could have spent $200 for a Amiga CVPPC card (Hado ne, but becided the point) Then another $175 for a Delfina or like sound card, then another $120 for the Xsurf card and still not have a tower for what I paid for the mediator. Now sure you all say what about the cards you need to still add??? Well I got a TrendNET 10/100 card for $5 new. I had a voodoo 3000 and got a few more free, but even on ebay they are $20 all the time. The sound card I use now I only paid $8 new for it. Its a FM801 based card and sounds just as good as the Delfina a friend has. Pluss all the other cards I can get. Sure the spider is a rebadged card, but its only $50 compaired to the slower $120 again cards from other makers for the amiga.

It all goes back to the fact that this card should have sold for no more then $75 and he would have sold a LOT more at that. The work in the A2000/3000/4000 which several people still have and use.

[Doobrey]

NightShade737 wrote:
Right, so your arguments basically say that, if you cant do it yourself cheaper, then you can't argue.

Nope, what MikeyMike was saying is that it`s clear you have no idea how much it costs to produce electronic goods in small quantities.
 If you feel it`s a rip off, why not tell us how much you realistically think an X-Surf can be made for in a run of 100 cards?

[Ilwrath]

@Patrik-
I can no longer benchmark this card, as it fried itself.  It was in a 4000D with SuperBuster 11 and a CyberStorm 060 Mk2.

I never got the card properly working with my old AmiTCP 2.x, and didn't have Genesis at the time (before OS3.9 was released).  Miami was the only modern TCP stack I had.  I will say the MNI driver integration was very slick and easy to configure with MiamiDX.  

Thanks for the link to ttcp.  I currently have a C=2065 in the same machine, which I can post marks from to back up my assertation that cards from 10 years earlier produce better speeds, if someone would be kind enough to post some MNI figures from an X-Surf on a similiar machine.

[patrik]

Hi everyone!

In the light of this thread I took the opportunity and benchmarked a friends X-Surf 1, mounted in his A3000 with ttcp and here are the results:

Amiga = Amiga A3000 030@25MHz/X-Surf 1/AmigaOS3.1, AmiTCP4.3
PC = Dell Latitude CPi PII@300MHz/Netgear FA411/Linux 2.4.25
Mac = IBook G3-750FX@800MHz/Builtin NIC/MacOS 10.3.3

Switch = HP Procurve 408

TCP: Amiga->PC
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 10.95.1.73
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 44.04 real seconds = 372.03 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2048 I/O calls, msec/call = 22.02, calls/sec = 46.50
ttcp-t: 0:44real
TCP: PC->Amiga
ttcp-r: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp
ttcp-r: 16777216 bytes in 32.56 real seconds = 503.19 KB/sec +++
ttcp-r: 2302 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.48, calls/sec = 70.70
ttcp-r: 0:32real
UDP: Amiga->PC
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  udp  -> 10.95.1.73
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 28.40 real seconds = 576.90 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2054 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.16, calls/sec = 72.32
ttcp-t: 0:28real
TCP: Amiga->Mac
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 10.95.1.10
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 43.18 real seconds = 379.43 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2048 I/O calls, msec/call = 21.59, calls/sec = 47.43
ttcp-t: 0:43real
TCP: Mac->Amiga
ttcp-r: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp
ttcp-r: 16777216 bytes in 30.36 real seconds = 539.66 KB/sec +++
ttcp-r: 2308 I/O calls, msec/call = 13.47, calls/sec = 76.02
ttcp-r: 0:30real
UDP: Amiga->Mac
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  udp  -> 10.95.1.10
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 30.06 real seconds = 545.04 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2054 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.99, calls/sec = 68.33
ttcp-t: 0:30real

Switch = DLink DES-1008D

TCP: Amiga->PC
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 10.95.1.73
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 44.10 real seconds = 371.52 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2048 I/O calls, msec/call = 22.05, calls/sec = 46.44
ttcp-t: 0:44real
TCP: PC->Amiga
ttcp-r: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp
ttcp-r: 16777216 bytes in 32.54 real seconds = 503.50 KB/sec +++
ttcp-r: 2306 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.45, calls/sec = 70.87
ttcp-r: 0:32real
UDP: Amiga->PC
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  udp  -> 10.95.1.73
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 28.34 real seconds = 578.12 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2054 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.13, calls/sec = 72.48
ttcp-t: 0:28real
TCP: Amiga->Mac
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 10.95.1.10
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 41.66 real seconds = 393.28 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2048 I/O calls, msec/call = 20.83, calls/sec = 49.16
ttcp-t: 0:41real
TCP: Mac->Amiga
ttcp-r: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp
ttcp-r: 16777216 bytes in 30.18 real seconds = 542.88 KB/sec +++
ttcp-r: 2307 I/O calls, msec/call = 13.40, calls/sec = 76.44
ttcp-r: 0:30real
UDP: Amiga->Mac
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  udp  -> 10.95.1.10
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 30.06 real seconds = 545.04 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2054 I/O calls, msec/call = 14.99, calls/sec = 68.33
ttcp-t: 0:30real

(edit): I would say that these results are really good, especially considering that the Amiga is only powered by a 030@25MHz.

Have fun!


/Patrik

[Ilwrath]

This was the only test I ran, since it's really not a fair fight.  My Amiga rig outspecs yours by quite some distance.  

Amiga 4000/CyberStorm Mk2 060 @50mhz / Amiga 2065 network card / OS3.9 Genesis IP stack

PC SlotA Athlon @650 / Windows 2000 Server / RealTek PCI

Switch Junk EtherEngine 800S [10/100 / 8port] (budget special)

Your Score:

TCP: Amiga->PC
ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001 tcp -> 10.95.1.73
ttcp-t: 16777216 bytes in 44.04 real seconds = 372.03 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2048 I/O calls, msec/call = 22.02, calls/sec = 46.50
ttcp-t: 0:44real

My Score:
6.Ram Disk:> ttcp -t 192.168.0.1 ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 192.168.0.1
ttcp-t: socket
ttcp-t: connect
ttcp-t: 19983000 bytes in 27.42 real seconds = 711.79 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2440 I/O calls, msec/call = 11.51, calls/sec = 89.00
ttcp-t: 0:27real

Like I said... It's not a fair fight.  My Amiga is a higher spec.  But when I was running the XSurf, it turned in a performance a lot closer to yours than it does to my 2065.

[kgrach]

@nightshade


I have seen you rant on numerous web sites about amiga hardware costs.

nightshade here is a challange for you.

get an Xsurf or a picture of an xsurf get a list of all components on the board.
price how much it would cost you to buy 100 pieces of each part. Get the quotes and post them here

if the cost of all the components is less than $35 dollars per board I will buy you an Xsurf.

remember the boards still have to be assembled, shipped to dealers and the dealers have to make a few bucks say like $5 or tens dollars or they won't even bother to sell your product. even with you making zero profit that board would cost the public $90.00

kgrach

[Ilwrath]

Actually, curiousity got the best of me, so I ran all relevant tests.  Here's the results:

Amiga -> PC (TCP)
6.Ram Disk:> ttcp -t 192.168.0.1 ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 192.168.0.1
ttcp-t: socket
ttcp-t: connect
ttcp-t: 19983000 bytes in 27.42 real seconds = 711.79 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2440 I/O calls, msec/call = 11.51, calls/sec = 89.00
ttcp-t: 0:27real

Amiga -> PC (UDP)
6.Ram Disk:> ttcp -t -u 192.168.0.1 ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  udp  -> 192.168.0.1
ttcp-t: socket
ttcp-t: 19983000 bytes in 23.45 real seconds = 832.21 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2444 I/O calls, msec/call = 9.82, calls/sec = 104.22
ttcp-t: 0:23real

PC -> Amiga (TCP)
D:\WORK> ttcp -t 192.168.0.43 ttcp-t: buflen=8192, nbuf=2048, align=16384/0, port=5001  tcp  -> 192.168.0.43
ttcp-t: socket
ttcp-t: connect
ttcp-t: 19583920 bytes in 28.05 real seconds = 681.89 KB/sec +++
ttcp-t: 2446 I/O calls, msec/call = 11.74, calls/sec = 87.21

PC -> Amiga (UDP)
* Clearly invalid results [>11000KB/sec -- not sure why?]

[NightShade737]

What sites exactly have I been ranting on?

Anyway, I can't find any pictures in a high enough res to be able to check all of the components, and I also wouldn't have time to anyway.

[patrik]

@Ilwrath:

Actually, curiousity got the best of me, so I ran all relevant tests. Here's the results:

Cheers :=)

PC -> Amiga (UDP)
* Clearly invalid results [>11000KB/sec -- not sure why?]

As UDP does neither guarantee or check if data arrives, the pc will push as much packets it can at the current link speed, disregarding if the other end can cope with it or not, which is the reason for the high results. In this case, it will just end up with the switch throwing most packets away and the ttcp app on the Amiga shouldnt consider it as a completed session as it hasnt been able to recieve enough packets. I also tried a this with a crossover cable to get the linkspeed down to 10mbit, but as the Amiga I benchmarked cant cope with a fully utilized 10mbit connection either, that didnt work. In short - for the UDP tests of ttcp to work, the reciever must be able to cope with the packet-rate the sender can manage to send.

Just as a sidenote, the results you got with your A4000 + CSPPC + A2065 look very similar to the results I got with my A4000 + CSPPC + A2065 ;=).


/Patrik

[Ilwrath]

@Patrik-

Thanks for the UDP info.  I knew UDP wouldn't try to resend lost data, but I was assuming it had some throttling mechanism.  (Hey, it was late at night.  haha!)

Just as a sidenote, the results you got with your A4000 + CSPPC + A2065 look very similar to the results I got with my A4000 + CSPPC + A2065 ;=).

Actually, mine is only a CyberStorm Mk2 060, not a PPC.  But, yes, it's not very surprising that it would turn in similiar marks to a Mk3 060/PPC, considering the stack and app are 68k.  ;-)

In retrospect, those XSurf numbers don't look horrible, and would actually result in better performance than my XSurf ever got.  Maybe I just had a lemon, all the way around.  I still wouldn't recommend the card... even to an enemy.

I hadn't run ttcp before.... But for a large file transfer (FTP) between my Amiga and my server, my XSurf would average around 200kB/sec, while my 2065 goes to just a hair under 700kB/sec.

[Cass]

Reminds me an old thread about this topic...

A2065 hasn't a RJ45 plug isn't this true? How you plug it in modern 10/100 cards? Do you use some kind of hub (multiple jacks?)

Would it be possible to built a Zorro-III 100Mbps eth card (equals ~12.5MB/sec transfer speeds)? A recent benchmark on my ZIII gfx card showed a 7MB/sec transfer rate...
________
Iolite vaporizer

[Kronos]

@Cass

Problem is, you will hardly any 100MBit chips with an ISA-interface, while
that is no prob for 10MBit chips. And building a Z2-to-PCI interface costs much
more than a Z2-to-ISA interface.


Make it an Z3-2-PCI interface, combined with the low number that can expected
to be sold (~100), and you might end up at over 200Euro ......

And you won't be able to sell even 100 at that price ....

But really is that a problem ? You got Amigas with PCI-bridges, you got
Amigas with HighWay/Algor (allowing for the Norway-upgrade), you got the X-Surf,
and you got lots of 2nd hand cards.

[patrik]

@Cass:

I use a 10BaseT transceiver connected to the AUI-port of the A2065 to get a RJ45 connector. There are lots of different transceivers, I happen to use this one as I got it with the A2065 card.

It would indeed be possible to build a ZorroIII 10/100Mbps ethernet NIC. The bandwidth of the ZorroIII bus would be adequate if the NIC was constructed well as the ZorroIII bus can do over 15MByte/Sec with a CV64 and an appropriate CPU-card (such as for example the Commodore original 030 card or the CSPPC). To fully utilize a full duplex 100mbit connection, a bandwidth of approximately 25MByte/sec would be required, but this bandwidth would seldom be needed during normal operation.

Anyhow, the ZorroIII bus would not be the limiting factor of speed if such a card would be produced. Given that the card was constructed in a really good way with support for scatter/gather dma transfers, delayed interrupts, hardware checksum offload and maybe even more features to reduce system load, there would still exist some big performance hinders.

These are a combination of the SanaII-standard, the current TCP/IP stacks and the socket api (the socket api is almost impossible to keep given the current AmigaOS functionality if one wants to remove the negative impact it has on performance). As it is right now, these hinders put too much stress is put on the memory-system and cpu... and the fact that almost none of the existing cards support any of the hardware features I listed above (the one on the DKB-wildfire supports DMA transfers if I am not mistaken) makes the situation even worse... ever wondered why Amigas even when equipped with a 68060 currently has problems fully utilizing even a 10Mbit link?

If anyone is interested in this subject, a good article can be found  here.


/Patrik