ISDN Cards - Options

[ElijahBaley]

Hi,

Just wondered if anyone could give me some advice regarding the purchase of a ISDN TA for a PowerMac G4.

Why are ISDN cards so expensive for Apple Macs?, when I can get PC ISDN cards for less than £50/$70, the Mac cards seem to go for 1000's!!!

Am I missing something here?, all I want is a simple card to initiate a call and transmit over a two channel BRI

Thanks for any comments

 

[jimbopalmer]

Ok I am not up on UK pricing, but here is a link:

http://www.dsiweb.co.uk/webjet/webjet128usb.htm

this product should allow an external serial TA to work with USB:

http://www.zones.com/cgi-bin/zones/site/product/index.html?id=000303586&zone=mac

I just realized you may be running OSX rather than MacOS

http://www.hermstedt.com/english/update/updateLeoISDN.html

http://www.hermstedt.com/english/hardware/webshuttle_II.html

http://www.hermstedt.com/english/hardware/leonardo_usb.html

here are more mac drivers

http://www.four-sight.co.uk/support/supp_downloads.lasso

I tried to remain child-like, all I acheived was childish.

 

[duncdude]

The reason you are confused is this:-

The iSDN cards for Mac's that cost £alot are '4Sight' compliant. This allows the Mac to dial up another Mac and start transmitting files. This hardware, usually '4Sight' or 'Hermstedt' is predominantly used in the prepress arena. This is a fast dying technology due to high speed Broadband e-mail.

Do you just need an iSDN Terminal Adaptor for dialup to the web - very different indeed. This should cost less than £100 and will connect via USB.

For the same reason as above though I am surprised that this is what you require. Wouldn't Broadband do the job. It's a heck of alot quicker!

To compare:-

iSDN uses 2 x 64k data channels -> 128k maximum throughput

Broadband (normal rate in the U.K.) connects at 576k -> over 4 times faster

Hope this explains...

Regards
Duncan

 

[ElijahBaley]

Thanks for your help, I will take a look at the links provided.

Yes we will need the card to transfer pre-press files to a printer. Does this mean that I really will need the TA to be '4Sight' compliant ?

I have found an external USB ISDN TA and was considering buying that, but I suppose I had better hold fire for now.

I would have thought that printers would have adopted a broadband file transfer capability by now (FTP), but apparently they still insist on ISDN, we will have a 1MB leased line available but I will also need to incorp the 2x64Kbps ISDN as well!.

 

[duncdude]

This will make you laugh - I've just read MacUser this morning, 5th September 2003, and it has a report on page 16 with the heading:

"Square rescues ISDN users as Wam!Net closes 4Sight"

It states in the article that 4Sight will close on the 12th September. It will, however, be run by 'The Square Group' after that date.

This reflects the state of the ISDN market.

The article also states... "although development of 4Sight software has effectively ceased, ISDN still has some legs left"

The Square Group hopes to migrate users to web-based file transfer systems.

Duncan

 

[duncdude]

Oh... and the next page says that 'Hermstedt' closed its sole UK office last month although they will continue to support their 15,000 UK customers

Duncan

 

[ElijahBaley]

Hmmn, I have had to take the plunge and lease a Card for a fortnight, cost.. £398.00 !!!

 

[maxformed]

The cost can be quite prohibitive. My boss was looking into a similar thing for her PC for faxing, but it turns out to be much cheaper to just get an external fax-modem for her setup.

Are there no FTP options at the printer - I have a similar situation with a printer. I've just taken to putting everything on CDs (they are cheap) and sending a messenger if it needs to be there super fast. Otherwise, normal shipping.

Sorry about the outrageous prices. I'd definitely look for another way to get files to them.

http://artechllc.com

 

[duncdude]

I've got a 4Sight card i'll sell you for that!

I'm serious!!!

Duncan