what about 48 bits?

John Kristoff jtk at cymru.com
Wed Apr 7 12:29:08 UTC 2010


On Tue, 06 Apr 2010 23:02:12 -0400
joel jaeggli <joelja at bogus.com> wrote:

> > Ah, but what _caused_ Ethernet to become ubiquitous, given the
> > price was initially comparable?
> 
> Early standardization.

In one of my other favorite books, Gigabit Ethernet, Rich Seifert says:

  "[...] IBM was the only computer *systems* manufacturer actively
  promoting a Token Ring-based strategy.  Ultimately, the reason we
  build networks is to attach the computers that supports the users'
  applications.  Network equipment vendors provide products to support
  the interconnection of the computers, but the network is the means,
  not the end.  Ethernet had the necessary broad support from many
  computer systems manufacturers from the very beginning, including not
  only the original DIX consortium, but also major players like Sun
  Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard, and dozens of others."

John




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