Acorn System Econet Node

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 Acorn Econet (front)

 Acorn Econet (back)

This is a Acorn Econet card from a System 4. The part no. is 200,024 issue 1.

 Acorn Econet Node (front)

 Acorn Econet Node (back)

This is an Acorn Econet card from a System 5. It is part no. 200,024 Issue 2.

The card has a Motorola MC68B54L advanced data link control IC to manage the network interface. The bank of links in the top middle of the board are used to set the fileserver network addess (I assume).

The econet communicationns network system was developed by Acorn to enable a number of Atoms and/or other systems to communicate with one another and to share facilities such as discs and printers.

All stations have equal status and, unless specifically prohibited, any station may communicate with any other without recourse to an intermediary. The only unique station is the one that generates the network clock, but this may be an Atom or larger system.

 ECONET EUROCARD INTERFACE 
The Econet Eurocard is the system version of the Econet interface card that fits into the Atom computer. It plugs into the backplane and carries the ROM with the low level Econet software to allow the local system to be linked to other Acorn products.
 
ECONET SPECIFICATION

• Up to 255 stations per Econet.
• Econets may be joined together by gateways.
• Connection by 4-wire cable to each station.
• Station seperation up to 1 Kilometer.
• Data transfer rate up to 210 kilobaud.
• Differential signals for high noise-immunity and minimal radiation.
• Clash detection circuitry, collision-arbitration algorithm minimise need for retries.
• Econet executed automatically on BRK.