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1. Embed this notice
   Veronica Explains (vkc@linuxmom.net)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:56:36 JST Veronica Explains

   Adding an ISA Ethernet card today so I can test my website using the only performance test that matters: Netscape Navigator on my 486.

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   • Embed this notice
     Rich Felker (dalias@hachyderm.io)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:57:24 JST Rich Felker

     in reply to

     • DrYak

     @dryak Oh. That might be what you'd want if running ancient DOS but not if running Linux or BSD..

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     Rich Felker (dalias@hachyderm.io)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:57:26 JST Rich Felker

     in reply to

     • DrYak

     @dryak I don't know enough to say but I figured a kernel that supports running on such old hardware would have drivers for whatever hardware you would use to get USB on such a machine.

   • Embed this notice
     DrYak (dryak@mstdn.science)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:57:26 JST DrYak

     in reply to

     • Rich Felker

     @dalias oh, I see. Well, thing is: these are not like PCI USB cards (or built in port) which work as long as you have standard UHCI or OHCI drivers (some even exist for DOS).
     The CH375 is a small microcontroller which on one side speaks to a USB device and on the other exposes an emulated peripheral on the ISA bus.
     i.e. the handling of USB devices doesn't happen inside the host computer, but inside the card itself, thus you can use it an meager ancient 8bit hardware (e.g. Book8088)

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     Rich Felker (dalias@hachyderm.io)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:57:29 JST Rich Felker

     in reply to

     @vkc Another way to do it if ISA network card is hard to come by: ISA USB card. 😁

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     DrYak (dryak@mstdn.science)'s status on Sunday, 25-Aug-2024 02:57:29 JST DrYak

     in reply to

     • Rich Felker

     @dalias oh, you mean someone has written a driver+firmware combo for those CH375 ISA cards that does NE2000 emulation instead of HD? That would be very interesting to me!

     (context: my Pocket386 has such a CH375 onboard)