At 08:49 AM 24-04-97 -0500, Tim Salo wrote:
It is probably useful to differentiate between Netstar, which was recently acquired by Ascend, and the rest of Ascend. The GigaRouter was developed by Netstar prior to its acquisition by Ascend.
-tjs
Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought the GRF-400 was an Ascend product and the GRF-1600 is the NetStar GigaRouter, with some additional developments.
Am I right?
A very brief synopsis of the Netstar/Ascend GigaRouter/GRF history: June 1994: GigaRouter - Original Creation of Netstar, 16 slot chassis, external UNIX-centric router manager system, etc. Ships to first customer in Germany. 1995: GigaRouter II - Version #2 of the original.. Better (blue) cabinet with more easily serviced parts (fans, power supplies, etc); external PC now industrialized (SCSI rather than IDE, for example and rack mountable rather than tabletop). Also new rev of router manager board (card that fills the center slot). Various other minor changes. August 1996: - Ascend acquires Netstar ($305M) and calls the Netstar operation "Ascend's High Performance Networking Division." Says, "Who in their right mind would buy a 16 slot box? Make a 4 slot box instead." October 1996: - HPND finds a chainsaw a chops 12 slots off the GigaRouterII, and puts it in (yet another) new Ascendish cabinet. Backplane componentry stays the same, except slots 5-16 (which don't exist) aren't wired. External Router Manager System (UNIX platform) previously run on a standalone PC rolled under the hood. Router manager board obsolete in the new order. New product called the GRF400. Netstar OS v5.0 software renamed Ascend Embedded OS v1.0. 4Q1996 - GRF400 met with enthusiasm by customers, for a variety of reasons.. Complaints of, "4 slots just aren't enough" are however heard. Ascend directs HPND to establish a new vision and build a 16 slot box. 1Q1997 - HPND finds the 12 slots on the floor from the previous chainsawwing and glues them to the developments of the GRF400: Underhood RMS, Ascendish-cabinet, etc. GRF1600 is born. Very early 1997 - Ascend shows the new GRF1600. -Jeff -- Jeff Wabik E/Mail: jeff@netstar.com Ascend Communications (www.ascend.com) Phone: +1 612 996 6814 High Performance Networking Division FAX: +1 612 943 8939 Minneapolis, MN 55344 Pager: +1 800 493 9804 "The artists formerly known as Netstar, Inc."