Wired Q: Embedded NT

Tue May 26 01:45:19 UTC 1998

At 12:36 PM -0400 5/25/98, dirk at power.net wrote:
>Can't you smell a clever market research plot from Microsoft when
>you see one? Whoever started this is just testing the waters for
>embedded NT...

Yup. The question was originally posted by by someone from Wired to get
info on an article for someone else from Wired.

Most likely they are doing a review of a) berkeley networks product or b) a
review of the new book "Gigabit Ethernet Handbook" by Stephen Saunders.
This book devotes a whole chapter (only about 20 pages) to Berkeley
Networks "NT Switches", describing them as a "new class of switched
internetworking platform ... to transform today's networks from passive
data conduits to application-aware communication and control
infrastructures" (pg 180). BTW, "application-aware" means the ability to
block Doom traffic. (their example).

Although the book is allegedly technical, this chapter is nothing but
marketing BS.  (And full of warmed over ideas, recast as "brilliant
inovations", which is typical of MS partners, to boot)  This chapter was
written by 4 people from Berkeley Networks, including the VP of Marketing.
This chapter clearly belongs in a marketing brochure, not a book on gigabit
ethernet. So, I'll pan both the book, and judging from the chapter on
Berkeley Networks "NT switch", their product as well.

I really don't think that (note the quotes) "NT-Switches represent a
fundamental shift in the business model of networking vendors." (pg 201,
Conclusion: The Future of NT-Switches)

The chapter makes it sound like everyone has one, and thats all they use.
Unless the world changed a lot since Friday, I don't think this is the
case. In fact, does *anyone* actually have any of these?

		--Dean

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