the digital forest

The New Ascend Router


The Ascend Pipeline 25 is a full-featured ISDN-to-Ethernet router designed for the SOHO (small office, home office) market. Here in Japan, its reasonable (approx.) ¥95,000 street price makes it a suitable alternative to an ISDN TA (terminal adapter) or ISDN card for your computer.

By Forest Linton

The P25 has a list of features that will satisfy the most technically demanding user. The P25 is intended to connect up to four users to a remote office network or Internet provider. It connects to a workstation or small hub via standard 10-baseT Ethernet, which supports all computer platforms. The P25 does require that you install an ISDN line, but once you do, it can handle all of your telephony needs (with your current phone equipment), thus eliminating the need for an analog line. The Ascend P25 router comes equipped with analog phone jacks that allow the connection of up to three analog phones, faxes, or regular modems.

Before I continue, let me remind you that an ISDN (integrated services digital network) connection actually consists of two lines (B-channels) that each offer 64K-bps throughput. You pay only one base monthly fee for the ISDN line, but for usage NTT will charge you per minute, per B channel. So if the rate is ¥10 per minute, and you use both B-channels at the same time, you will be charged ¥20 per minute.

To help you deal with all this, the P25 has what is called "Dynamic Bandwidth Allocation," and it is really cool. Let's say you are connected to your provider on one B-channel, surfing the Web, not using much bandwidth -- and then you decide to download the latest version of Netscape (a 4MB file). The P25 senses the increased load and opens a data connection on the second B-channel, giving you 128K-bps throughput and speeding you on your way. But about halfway through you remember that you forgot to make an important call to your broker, so in a panic you grab the phone and rush to dial. The P25 smoothly drops your data connection back down to one B-channel (64K bps), thus freeing a line for your call in less than a second.

While chatting on the phone, your download ends, so after a minute of no activity, the P25 cuts the connection to your provider to save money. You're still talking to your broker when a fax for tonight's beer bash comes in over the P25's second analog port; yes, you can use both B-channels for analog calls.

Ascend's "Bandwidth on Demand" feature establishes and removes connections as needed. For example, when not in use, a connection will typically "time-out," or disconnect, to save on your phone bill. But if the P25 detects IP activity from your computer, it automatically redials. An ISDN connection takes only one second to establish, so all of this happens transparently to the user. The connect speed is so fast that it seems you are attached to a permanent leased line.

If your P25 is "talking" to another Ascend product, optional compression can boost throughput up to 512K bps. Built-in security features include packet filtering, callback, and PAP and CHAP authentication. The P25 offers PPP, MPP, and MPP+ connectivity and telnet remote management; it is certified for use in 26 countries worldwide, including Japan.

Setting up the P25 can take a bit of time. You connect to it via a serial cable and standard VT100 communications program. Once "inside the P25," there are quite a few settings you'll need to get right; you'll pretty much have to do this together with your provider (if you are connecting to the Internet) or your network administrator (if you are connecting to a remote network).

Once you get it right, however, things are stable. The Ascend P25 comes with pretty good documentation. I am currently using ISDN and a P25, and it works great. I can highly recommend this solution to anyone who needs fast access to the Internet but isn't ready for a leased line.

For more information about the P25 and other Ascend products, go to http://www.ascend.com/ (English) or http://www.ascend.co.jp/ (Japanese). Ascend KK can be reached in Tokyo at 03-5322-2850.

Special thanks to TWICS for providing the IP connectivity for my tests.ç

Forest Linton is living, learning, and working hard at Koyosha Graphics in Tokyo, Japan. You'll find links to his Japan Web Guide and The Digital Forest at http://www.computingjapan.com/magazine/bios.

Millionaires on the Net

Envious of the 24-year-old university student, Marc Andreesen, who created Mosaic, then went on to cofound Netscape? He's now worth over $100 million.

Well, there are plenty more just like him. There is an interesting Web site that tracks those who have made their millions on the Net. Here are some highlights from the site, which is available at http://www.pulver.com:80/million/. (These figures are updated every 15 minutes based on current market value.)

  • Jim Clark Netscape $937,980,000
  • Jim Barksdale Netscape $405,300,000
  • Rick Adams UUNet $277,875,000
  • William Melton Cybercash $76,000,000
  • Bill Schraeder PSI $45,570,000
  • Steven Kirsch Infoseek $34,571,000

If you are interested in the recent phenomenon of "nerds" becoming millionaires, I also recommend a fascinating program that aired this spring in the States on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). "Triumph of the Nerds" is available on video, and there is information available at http://www.pbs.org/
nerds/.