Local Area Networking

The proliferation of personal computers (PCs) as a business tool has driven the need for a distributed processing environ- ment where many microcom- puters can share expensive peripheral devices, such as printers and hard disk drives. The capability to network equipment also enables users to share files and programs and to centralize backup facilities and procedures. Local Area Networking has two main requirements. It must be implemented in VLSI, to sim- plify design and lower the overall "per node" cost of con- nection to a network. Second, the LAN must also run standar- dized software and conform to an industry standard, so that end users can interconnect equipment from different ven- dors without worrying about protocols. The IEEE 802.3 standard (EthernetTM) has gained wide acceptance by both large and small companies as a -high- speed (10 megabit/second) LAN. However, because of its cable requirements, it can be relatively expensive to imple- ment. In response to this drawback...