Life of a Sysadmin

The occassional trials and tribulations of a jack of all tr ades sysadmin in a startup in Silicon Valley

archives

October 2008 (2)
September 2008 (3)
June 2008 (1)
April 2008 (1)
March 2008 (6)
December 2007 (6)
October 2007 (1)
September 2007 (1)
August 2007 (2)
July 2007 (1)
June 2007 (5)
May 2007 (5)
April 2007 (3)
March 2007 (7)
February 2007 (2)
January 2007 (3)
December 2006 (4)
November 2006 (3)
October 2006 (3)
August 2006 (3)
July 2006 (1)
June 2006 (2)
May 2006 (4)
April 2006 (2)
March 2006 (5)
February 2006 (5)
January 2006 (7)
December 2005 (2)
November 2005 (6)
October 2005 (4)
September 2005 (4)
August 2005 (1)
July 2005 (2)
June 2005 (3)
May 2005 (4)
April 2005 (1)
March 2005 (2)

March 2006

What the heck, or Yes it really is what you think it is

On one end is a parallel port connection. The other has a an rj45 ethernet jack and a barrel plug connecting to an inline ps2 style connector. Yep, this is indeed a parallel port ethernet adapter. The ps2 plug provides power from the keyboard port to the adapter. A particularly nice touch, is that the red stripe is a rubber belt with notches on it that when spun around the body turns the screws that lock the adapter to the port.

I last used this in college on a Windows ME laptop with a dead pcmcia slot. It wasn't particularly fast, it chewed up the processor, but it provided enough of a network connection to transfer all the data off of the machine. It's a neat device, but considering USB has basically been standard since Pentium IIs, and USB flash disks and ethernet adapters are so cheap, this has been relegated to my shelf of cool old stuff.

Intel (who purchased Xircom in 2001) has a support site (including drivers) up for the product.