Really small business network - Moses Computers' MosesAll! for DOS 3.0 local area network - Hardware Review - Evaluation

Home Office Computing, April, 1993 by Jack Nimersheim

MosesAll! Rating: ***

For DOS

AT A GLANCE: Inexpensive package that offers affordable networking capabilities to home-office or small-business users. Some technical knowledge is required to install and configure the MosesAll! card, which must be inserted within an expansion slot on each networked PC.

DOCUMENTATION: In less than 100 pages, the MosesAll! documentation explains networking in language that even a nontechnical user can understand. Its explanation of the technical aspects of configuring the network card, however, is a little sparse. The lack of an index makes it difficult to find information on a specific topic.

EASE OF USE: Once you successfully install

MosesAll!, using it is a breeze.

SUPPORT: Competent technical support offered to all registered users, but the support number is not toll-free.

VERSION REVIEWED: 3.0 (MosesNOS network operating system)

LIST PRICE: $99 per computer (node)

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: 640K 8088 PC or higher; hard-disk drive required on network server; Hercules, CGA, EGA, VGA, SVGA; DOS 3.3 or higher

MANUFACTURER: Moses Computers, 15466 Los Gatos Blvd. #201, Los Gatos, CA 95032; (408) 358-1550

MosesAll!'s $99-per-computer (node) price brings the cost of a local area network (LAN) within easy financial reach of almost anyone, including the smallest small business. Be aware, however, that if you're not technically adroit, you'll probably need help getting MosesAll! up and running properly on your PCs. Although not as difficult to install as some of the competition (such as Novell's NetWare Lite), MosesAll! isn't a straightforward "plug-and-play" network, either.

Conflict correcting. The half-slot MosesAll! network card comes set up to work on a typical PC. Its IRQ (interrupt), DMA, and I/O (input/output) address settings are configured so they will not conflict with standard PC components (serial ports, parallel ports, etc.). Unfortunately, there really is no such thing as a standard PC. If your PC includes a piece of equipment that conflicts with the MosesAll! card--as was the case with the built-in mouse port on my video card--you'll need to manually modify its default settings by choosing settings from the network installation screen. Doing so can be a daunting task for the nontechnical user. This isn't a fatal flaw (and in fairness, it's a problem any manufacturer of network products confronts), but it is something you should know about.

The good news is that this hardware hump is the hardest obstacle to overcome when setting up MosesAll! After all your cards and cables are in place and working properly, installing MosesNOS, the network operating system, is a relative breeze. The reference manual provides complete, if sometimes overly technical, instructions on each step required to get two computers communicating with each other successfully through a MosesAll! network. And those first two computers are only the beginning. A single MosesAll! network can include up to eight different nodes. I can't think of many home offices or small businesses that would require a larger network.

Using it is easy. Once it's ready to run, MosesAll! runs superbly, both fast and flexible. Data exchange between networked computers is rated at an impressive 1.79 million-bits-per-second (mbps). With standard telephone cable, networked machines can be up to 150 feet apart from one another. (A 25-foot cable is included in the MosesAll! package.) Substituting a twisted-pair cable for the more common RJI 1 four-wire phone cable more than triples this distance to an amazing 500 feet.

Individual computers on a MosesAll! network can be identified as one of three types of nodes: server, redirector, or peer. A server is a computer that shares the resources connected to it (a printer, disk drives, and so forth) with other nodes. A redirector uses the resources provided by a server. (The more common name for redirector is client.) A peer can both share its resources and use the resources of other systems. These are all fairly common network concepts, and MosesAll! implements them much as you'd expect.

Add your own e-mail. One popular use of a network is to allow electronic communications, or e-mail, between nodes. MosesAll! does not include communications software. Because MosesAll! supports IBM's SMB standard, however, it will work with any e-mail program that also supports the SMB protocol, such as the popular Da Vinci package. The lack of built-in e-mail capabilities is one of the sacrifices you make when looking at an inexpensive way to network, a normally expensive undertaking.

Another limitation for anyone considering MosesAll! is that its adapter card uses a proprietary architecture. Consequently, it will not peacefully coexist with a non-Moses LAN. If you start with MosesAll!, you'll have to stay with MosesAll! exclusively. This isn't necessarily bad, mind you. It's just the way things are.

Which applications will work? Like all networks, MosesAll! recommends LAN-compatible software for those applications that will be used on multiple nodes concurrently. Standard DOS and Windows programs seem to run just fine under MosesAll! None of the applications I tested caused any problems. To ensure reliability, however, applications should only be able to be used by one person at a time. Here, again, MosesAll! and its MosesNOS operating system rely on standards that make finding true network software easy. Because it's fully compatible with NetBIOS and MS-DOS, MosesAll! should run any LAN-formatted applications that support these same standards.