Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!hao!ames!ucbcad!ucbvax!CS.UTAH.EDU!haas%gr From: haas%gr@CS.UTAH.EDU (Walt Haas) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip Subject: Re: Vitalink Bridges.. Message-ID: <8712102044.AA05561@gr.utah.edu> Date: 10 Dec 87 20:44:31 GMT References: <19509@amdcad.AMD.COM> Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 23 Keywords: Bridge, TCP/IP, Vitalink In article <19509@amdcad.AMD.COM>, percy@amdcad.AMD.COM (Percy Irani) writes: > > We have a Vitalink sales guy trying to sell Vitalink Bridges to our > Company. We primarily have TCP/IP hosts on the net. We also have > some DECNET hosts. > > What is attractive to some people (Sigh!) is that the Vitalink's will > be able to do protocol independant connections. I guess we can beat > the Vitalinks iff there is a router that does both IP and DECNET. > > IS THERE ONE AVAILABLE LIKE THAT TODAY???? > ------------------------------------------ There are at least two, cisco and Proteon. However the real advantage of level two bridges like the Vitalink is that they let you also run ISO, XNS, Ethertalk, Novell and what have you with no further modification. Given the dynamic state of protocols today this is a big advantage. For example, the low level protocols of DECnet will change drastically next year. Proteon and cisco may or may not keep up, but a level two bridge won't even notice. Cheers -- Walt Haas arpa: haas@cs.utah.edu uucp: ...utah-cs!haas