3Com Extends Industry Leading Adapter Technology to Growing PCI 10Mbps Ethernet Market; Newest member of EtherLink III family leverages PCI bus benefits while offering superior adapter performance.SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 27, 1995--The market leader in Ethernet adapters, 3Com Corporation, is extending its patented Parallel Tasking technology to the PCI (1) (Payment Card Industry) See PCI DSS. (2) (Peripheral Component Interconnect) The most widely used I/O bus (peripheral bus). 10Mbps Ethernet market. With the introduction of the EtherLink III Parallel Tasking PCI Bus Mastering network adapter, 3Com enables the growing number of PCI users to leverage the benefits of bus mastering PCI systems as well as obtain the superior performance of a 3Com Ethernet adapter. The newest member of 3Com's market-leading EtherLink III family, the EtherLink III PCI adapter, offers the industry's best price/performance. The EtherLink III PCI adapter performs up to 16 percent faster than four leading competitors in independent tests conducted by LANQuest Labs. The EtherLink III PCI, now shipping, has a suggested price of U.S. $149 for a single TPO (Twisted Pair Only) Refers to the use of twisted pair wire when other options are available. For example, a TPO suffix at the end of 3com Ethernet adapter model numbers indicates the card has only an RJ45 connector. adapter in a five pack and U.S. $179 for a single COMBO card in a five pack. With its ability for high data throughput for networks, disk drives, video and other high-speed peripherals, the PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect See PCI. (hardware) Peripheral Component Interconnect - (PCI) A standard for connecting peripherals to a personal computer, designed by Intel and released around Autumn 1993. PCI is supported by most major manufacturers including Apple Computer. ) local bus is rapidly becoming the standard bus for desktop PCs. Independent market analysts at Dataquest project PCI machine shipments may exceed 19 million in 1995, more than double the 1994 shipments. And, the growth will continue to be strong; 1996 projection is for more than 33 million PCI PCs. "It's clear that the industry is quickly adopting the PCI bus," said Doug Spreng, general manager and vice president of 3Com's Network Adapter Division. "The high number of PCI systems shipped indicate PCI will appear in both clients and servers on the network." Advantages of a PCI Adapter Because the PCI architecture allows for processing speeds that are up to 10 times faster than ISA (1) (Instruction Set Architecture) See instruction set. (2) (Interactive Services Association) See Internet Alliance. (3) (Internet Security and Acceleration) See .NET. , EISA (Extended ISA) Pronounced "ee-suh." A PC bus standard that extends the 16-bit ISA bus (AT bus) to 32 bits and provides bus mastering. ISA cards can plug into an EISA slot. and Micro Channel systems, users can realize performance improvements when running multiple applications. While multitasking increases productivity, it also creates high levels of demand on the PC's CPU CPU in full central processing unit Principal component of a digital computer, composed of a control unit, an instruction-decoding unit, and an arithmetic-logic unit. . The EtherLink III PCI adapter leverages the PCI bus mastering architecture and enables the adapter to independently read and write data to the system's memory, thus freeing up the CPU for other tasks. To maintain the high-level of data processing required for true multitasking, users need a PCI adapter. "With the EtherLink III PCI adapter, millions of 10Mbps Ethernet users can achieve a new level of multitasking computing offered by PCI systems," said Spreng. Industry's Only Guaranteed PCI Compatibility 3Com offers complete compatibility with any PCI-compliant machine, such as those from Compaq, Dell, Gateway 2000 and IBM (International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY, www.ibm.com) The world's largest computer company. IBM's product lines include the S/390 mainframes (zSeries), AS/400 midrange business systems (iSeries), RS/6000 workstations and servers (pSeries), Intel-based servers (xSeries) . 3Com is the only company to ensure PCI compatibility with a money-back guarantee. There are some PCI slots that are not fully bus mastering enabled, causing other manufacturer's PCI network adapters to be inoperable. 3Com designed its PCI adapter to work in any PCI slot, and with its guarantee, users do not have to worry about whether or not their PCI slot is bus mastering enabled. EtherLink III Benefits As with other EtherLink III adapters, the new EtherLink III PCI card offers users the broadest range of software support. In addition, 3Com provides one set of drivers for all of its new bus mastering adapters, including the recently announced Fast EtherLink 10/100 PCI and EISA adapters. This lessens the burden of software support for network managers. The 3Com adapters are the industry's easiest to install. In NetWare environments, the EtherLink III cards automatically install the NetWare Universal Client and auto-selects the connector, all in less than three minutes. SNMP-based management is provided through 3Com's Transcend WorkGroup Manager or any other standard SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) A widely used network monitoring and control protocol. Data are passed from SNMP agents, which are hardware and/or software processes reporting activity in each network device (hub, router, bridge, etc. manager. In addition, the EtherLink III PCI adapter supports the Desktop Management Interface (DMI (Desktop Management Interface) The first desktop management standard from the DMTF. Enabling PCs to be monitored from a central console, it was superseded by the DMTF's Common Information Model (see CIM). ) for management of any DMI-complaint software. 3Com guarantees all its adapters with an industry-leading lifetime warranty. All 3Com EtherLink III PCI products are available through the company's worldwide network of resellers and distributors. For more information call 1-800-Net 3Com. Founded in 1979, 3Com Corporation (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on :COMS COMS 3Com Corporation (stock symbol) COMS Certified Orientation and Mobility Specialist COMS Continuous Opacity Monitoring Systems COMS City of Manchester Stadium (UK) ) pioneered the data networking industry. Today, 3Com offers customers a broad range of ISO (1) See ISO speed. (2) (International Organization for Standardization, Geneva, Switzerland, www.iso.ch) An organization that sets international standards, founded in 1946. The U.S. member body is ANSI. 9000-compliant global data networking solutions that include routers, hubs, switches and adapters for Ethernet, Token Ring and high-speed networks. Headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif., 3Com, a Fortune 500 company, has worldwide research and development, manufacturing, marketing, sales and support capabilities. -0- Note to Editors: EtherLink, Parallel Tasking and Transcend are registered trademarks of 3Com Corporation. NetWare is a registered trademark of Novell, Inc. CONTACT: 3Com Public Relations, Santa Clara Valerie Bellofatto, 408/764-6194 Elizabeth Cardinale, 408/764-5303 |
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