On 2005-02-02 04:08:52 +1100, Larry W4CSC said:

"Meindert Sprang" wrote in
:

Imagine what it would to to the prices of all fairly cheap instruments
the moment they need a more powerfull processor and more memory to run
a TCP/IP stack......

Meindert


What processor? Off-the-shelf components used to interface cheap
computers to TCP/IP?
http://www.xs4all.nl/~ganswijk/chipdir/f/network.htm
http://www.chipcatalog.com/Cat/99.htm


Here's a whole Ethernet IP communications device on one IC...
http://www.anybus.com/eng/products/p...ctType=AnyBus-
IC

Oh, oh....I forgot.....these are STANDARIZED parts, not NMEA
manufacturer proprietaries.....(c;

Yeah, they'd raise the price $10/unit, I suppose.

Think the market would bear it if everything could talk to everything else?

Well I can't resist! The use of the TCP/IP stack for this application
is just plain stupid! Every recently manufactured car and there are a
hell of a lot of them has the Bosch 2 wire Controller Area Network
(CAN) communications bus connecting all the various elctronic
controllers. This bus is also the basis of NMEA 2000 spec. This
technology was designed for noisey environments, is robust and has very
high levels of silicon integration to get data on and off the bus.

BTW don't trash the technology just because the NMEA marketing arm has
it's 'head stuffed where the sun don't shine' It works very well in the
auto industry worldwide and should work as well in the marine industry
if the NMEA can get over their big boys club attitude to licensing IP!

Meindert is right TCP/IP is just plain stupid overkill!

--
Regards,
John Proctor VK3JP, VKV6789
S/V Chagall