DaynaPort E/II-T NuBus Ethernet card — MANUAL needed

[JDW]

I acquired a DaynaPort E/II-T NuBus Ethernet card for my Mac IIci, and the drivers for it are found on Macintosh Garden here:
https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/daynaport-drivers

QUESTION: I can't find the MANUAL anywhere. Do any of you have it?​

Pretty crazy but I can't even find it on the old Dayna website:
https://web.archive.org/.../dayna/products/intadapters.html

 

[Glenn Anderson]

I don't have the manual, but that card looks like a later revision of the Dayna/Kinetics/Novell EtherPort II, with coax swapped for 10base-T. Other than the differences for coax vs 10base-T, it seems to have all the same components in a similar but revised circuit board layout.

That would make J1 for an SRAM upgrade, from 8K to 32K, but your card doesn't have the SRAM chip socketed, so it is useless unless you want to unsolder the chip. The switch on the right is for selecting media type, AUI or 10base-T for your card. Here is a picture of an EtherPort II with the SRAM upgraded to a 32K 62256 chip and the jumper J1 installed. I've written drivers for the EtherPort II, so I'm very familiar with the architecture of these cards. Happy to try and answer any questions you have about them.

 

[JDW]

Wow, @Glenn Anderson ! Thanks for sharing that photo.

What's interesting about the driver installer I mentioned on Macintosh Garden is that it adds that into the System file, rather than installing a control panel or extension. I checked the System file in ResEdit before and after the install, and I spotted the resource the installer added. I guess it was easier to do that than to create a CP or INIT?

 

[Glenn Anderson]

Installing a resource in to the System file was typical, up until later System 7 versions and NSI 1.5. Those added a mechanism where the 'enet' resource can be put in to an extension file, which is much neater. However a lot of drivers and installers were never revised to work that way.

If you want, you can copy that 'enet' resource from the system file, and paste it in to a new file of type 'comd', and put that in the Extensions folder. Take a look at my drivers at https://www.mactcp.net/ethernet.html if you want an example.

You could also try my EtherPort IIN driver, it might work with your card. There are two NuBus board names that the Dayna driver checks for, "EtherPort IIN" and "PhoneNET® IIN". My driver checks for and only works with boards that identify as "EtherPort IIN", as I have never had a board that identifies as "PhoneNET® IIN" to test with.

 

[JDW]

@Glenn Anderson
Would you happen to know what the difference is between the DaynaPORT II & DaynaPORT (St.) II drivers shown below?

My card is the DaynaPORT E/II-T, as shown in the photo I posted previously. I assume one of those two drivers must be correct, as they are the only two with "II" in the name. But the "St." part has me confused, and the documentation about that is utterly absent.

I have another question, separate from the above...

The README says the following about DaynaPort SCSI...

I have installed that SCSI driver in order to get my BlueSCSIv2 PICO W to work, and it works well as I describe here. But currently I have my NuBus card removed. And the above README seems to say I cannot use my E/II-T NuBus card at all if I have the SCSI/Link driver installed. Is this true?

Thanks.

 

[Glenn Anderson]

@Glenn Anderson
Would you happen to know what the difference is between the DaynaPORT II & DaynaPORT (St.) II drivers shown below?

View attachment 13788

My card is the DaynaPORT E/II-T, as shown in the photo I posted previously. I assume one of those two drivers must be correct, as they are the only two with "II" in the name. But the "St." part has me confused, and the documentation about that is utterly absent.

Just looking through the resources for the installer, installing "DaynaPORT II" installs a driver for board ID 298, which is what I believe the DaynaPORT E/II-T is, the EtherPort II has that board ID. Installing the "DaynaPORT (St.) II" installs a driver for board ID 8. I have two of the DaynaPORT E/II-3, and it has board ID 8.

My best guess at what the "St." is referring to has to do with the branding for the chips used on the boards. The older DP8390 is the "NIC" for "Network Interface Controller", the DP83901 is the "SNIC" for "Serial Network Interface Controller" (it integrates the DP8391 serial network interface IC), and the DP83902 is the "ST-NIC" (the T added because it integrated 10base-T). The DaynaPORT E/II-3 has a DP83902 ST-NIC. However that is a pretty obscure thing to put in the user interface for the installer.

I have another question, separate from the above...

The README says the following about DaynaPort SCSI...

View attachment 13789

I have installed that SCSI driver in order to get my BlueSCSIv2 PICO W to work, and it works well as I describe here. But currently I have my NuBus card removed. And the above README seems to say I cannot use my E/II-T NuBus card at all if I have the SCSI/Link driver installed. Is this true?

Thanks.

A NuBus card with a SCSI ethernet is probably OK. You can't have more than one SCSI ethernet, or mix SCSI ethernet with Mac SE PDS cards, as they all want to have a driver named ".ENET0", and there is no way to handle more than one of those. For NuBus cards, IIsi, SE/30, LC PDS, CommSlot, built in ethernet, etc. there is a mechanism to handle more than one ethernet interface, and it shouldn't conflict with ".ENET0" ethernet driver.

Older versions of classic Mac OS, particularly if they don't have the newer AppleTalk installed, might have problems. However I think that Dayna installer installs a new enough AppleTalk. If you are trying to run something older than I think System 6.0.4 it could still be a problem.

 

[JDW]

If you are trying to run something older than I think System 6.0.4 it could still be a problem.

I am currently testing on my IIci, which I believe can run as old as 6.0.4, although I almost always use 6.0.8 whenever running System 6 on any of my Macs, including the SE/30. For now, I am doing most of my testing in System 7.1 and 7.6.1 (since 7.5.3 and 7.5.5 crash with Open Transport installed because I am using a DayStar Turbo040).

Anyway, thank you for your time in kindly clarifying matters for me!

 

[Glenn Anderson]

Just in case anyone else with a DaynaPort E/II-T is looking for information, this version of the DaynaPort E/II-T uses the "St." version of the driver. It also works with Apple's driver, but Apple's driver doesn't utilize all the RAM on the card.