Novell Inc has upgraded its NetWare SNA gateway and NetWare 3270 LAN Workstation, to provide a second Novell option on connecting Token-Ring local nets to IBM AS/400s. The latest announcement provides a Token Ring interface as part of an SNA gateway upgrade, whereas Novell’s previous offering in June was a gateway to the AS/400 via twin-axial connection using the NetWare Twinax Gateway. Novell reckons that 18% of the 80,000 installed AS/400s run local area nets and therefore have an interconnection requirement. At the moment that requirement is being met by IBM only, through its 3270 gateway. Novell claims that its approach provides several advantages over the IBM solution, primarily support for the both the IBM NetBIOS and SPX/IPX standards and less memory use on the personal computer 107Kb compared with IBM’s 384Kb. The Orem, Utah firm says support for SPX/IPX leads to performance advantages and a cut to network overheads. Novell also supports 5250 users via keyboard templates and files, included in the NetWare SNA Gateway.
