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I have quite a situation. A client of ours has signed up with Lucent's Extender boxes. What these boxes provide is data and voice trough an ISDN line. How can I connect a remote client to the 400 with this product? The 400 is V4R3 and has NO windows networking(no tcp configured). The way Lucent explained it to me was that the Extender boxes are "modems" and that I would just need to connect my comupter and 400 to them. When asked how can I do that, I was told that they don't know and that I needed to figure it out. Can I hook up this extender to my RS232 port? Can the 400 handle this ISDN technology in it's current release? Do I need to configure C/A with TCP/IP in order to get this working? Will this client walk away with a warm feeling inside?
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
There are many ways of accomplishing your goals, but Lucent should remain silent and be thought a fool, than to tell you to connect, and remove all doubt! If there is no LAN at the AS/400 end, I would connect the LAN to a 5494 remote control unit (or equivalent) at the remote end, and use CA/400 APPN (as opposed to TCP/IP) to establish the connection. You will need to configure the 5494. You will also need two synchronous modems. One at the AS/400 site, and the other for the 5494. If frame relay or ATM connections are available at both ends they may be used instead. As I said above, there are many alternatives to this. Dave -
Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
I just love it when vendors sell hardware and don't really provide any solutions. I have heard of these extender boxes and from what I understand they can be configured to support a variety of interfaces for data. Assuming a data port configuration of Ethernet I would suggest that you/your customer get the 400 running TCP/IP ... Assuming an Asynchronous data port I'd find another customer ... If the data port is Synchornous I'd use the 5494 that Dave suggested. Good LuckComment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
I am still learning about all this communications that the 400 provides. From what I understand of these extender boxes is that they act as modems. Is it possible to connect them to the ascII controller and configure a line that way? (using TCP/IP)The reason they want to stay with these extender boxes is because it is a fixed rate for the line. Do you know ehere I can go to research this? Thanks for the info.Comment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
You can use a standard Asynch modem from the comm port. You would need to use the CRTLINASC command to configure it. The line may then use a TCP/IP controller. For more info on how to do this, consult the IBM redbook "Cool Title about the AS/400 and the Internet" There are many who successfully use the ASCII workstation controller for asynch modems. I find it kludgy, and have never been able to properly set it up. I stand by my original suggestion for ease of use. DaveComment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
I hate to answer a question with a question. How many PC's/terminal/printers are you wanting to setup at the remote site? Do they currently have a 5x94 controller? Is Ethernet available at the remote site? If you must use Async you will need to be very aware of the distance between the remote PC's and the remote extender boxes. The maximum supported distance is 50' however I have done this from around 300' using very expensive shielded cables and/or async line drivers. The down side to using these is it adds an additonal level of complexity and introduces more failure points ... not to mention all the gray hair you'll get during the configuration and trouble shooting. Another alternative may be to use a router at the remote and local sites. I can't say for certain that using a Point-to-Point ASYNC connection will work ... but it might. If you do this then you will have the ability to use Ethernet as the connection at both the local and remote site ... Good LuckComment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
Jim, Just had a thought. Do you think it is possible to seeet up an ethernet network through these Extender boxes? Using TCP and let's say Ethernet cards at both the 400 end and the p.c. end. The Extwender box is no more that 3 feet from the p.c. so there wouldn't be any trouble there. Do you think the 400 will support this ISDN/TCP conenction? Hmmm. It sounds good enough.Comment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
Brendan, If the extender box has an ethernet interface ... ie 10/100base/T or AUI then I don't see why this wouldn't work. With out this interface you will need something (Router / Bridge) to provide it. If the remote site only has a few PC's a low-end bridge would probably work OK, however, remember that you will need to do Source Route Bridging (SRB) to keep the traffic across the ISDN to a minimum otherwise the ISDN connection will never come down since broadcast traffic will always be going across the link.Comment
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Connection Remote P.C.'s to the AS/400
Agreed, ask Lucent two things. 1)What type of physical connector can I use on the AS/400 side of the machine. 2)What link layer protocols does the box support on the AS/400. The ideal answer would be - ethernet connectors and ethernet protocols. Then you would treat this just like a ethernet lan. If you need to bring ISDN to the AS/400 that would be a different story. I don't think they'll tell you that though. If you need to bring X.25 or ASYNC to the AS/400 then look in Cool Title for examples. Don't let the "tragic boxes" fool you, you connect to the AS/400 in just a limited number of ways. Always shoot for the easiest way. Ethernet or Token Ring.Comment
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