Ariadne II Setup in Amiga 4000

[edd_jedi]

I have just bought an Ariadne II card for my A4000 to try out some basic network stuff. I would mainly like to use it for local file transfers, but as I have it I may as well dabble with web browsing and email etc too

So I have bought the card and am waiting for it to arrive, as far as I know it comes with no software or documentation so I have no idea how to set it up (guessing it's not plug and play.) I have downloaded the disk images from here, assuming they will help:

http://amiga.resource.cx/exp/ariadne2

Can anybody that has one give me any tips? Eg what I need to install before/after inserting the board, and if any other software apart from the drivers is required to connect to the web.

[thomas]

The driver (ariadneii.device) goes into the Devs:Networks directory (create it if it does not exist).

Then you need TCP/IP software, one of AmiTCP, Miami, Genesis or Roadshow.

[edd_jedi]

Thanks, should I add the driver before installing the board or does it not matter? Which of the TCP/IP programs do you think in the best choice?

[jayminer]

It doesn't matter if you install the driver before or after, it's not used until a TCP/IP-stack is active anyway.

I personally really like RoadShow. It costs 25 euro but I'd say it's definitely worth it.

If I recall correctly it has the best performance of the bunch, AmiTCP/Genesis is second best and Miami was the worst.

Miami is the easiest to set up though with it's MUI interface.

[edd_jedi]

OK thanks, as I'm new to this I think I'll give AmiTCP a go first as there appears to be a free version, but will certainly consider RoadShow in future. Is there a setup guide for AmiTCP anywhere? What kind of things do you have to setup, IP address etc?

EDIT: found this, seems simple enough but there are a lot of steps due to the installation errors, is there a less buggy (perhaps later) version?

http://www.wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de/~an...itcp/index.htm

[thomas]

AmiTCP is most difficult to get configured correctly.

As a beginner you should start with Miami 3.2b. The unregistered version runs for half an hour and then disconnects, but you can connect again.

Or try the floppy disks offered at the web page you linked. As far as I could see, they contain an OEM version of Genesis.

[edd_jedi]

All going well so far! Opted for AmiTCP, although a lot of setup is required I like the fact it doesn't depend on a GUI and is among the fastest. I'm using iBrowse as I can't get NetSurf AGA working.

I do have one question, I keep getting this message popup. Do I need to increase the amount of memory available, and if so how? I have 150MB Fast RAM, what's a sensible limit? And does it even make any difference, as far as I can see the browser still works fine even after the memory fills up (I assume it just dumps the cache?)

[thomas]

The message speaks of 255008 bytes, that's far away from a megabyte. I suppose there is a configuration parameter in AmiTCP which limits memory usage. You should increase the limit. Search for mbufs or something similar.