> Is it really that much for gigabit hardware? I doubt it. I think I've seen Netgear GigE cards for $57; but I could be wrong. > Is gigabit the cheapest alternative? probably. you might be able to hack together something to do IP-over-SCSI; but it's probably 10x the hassle and not much cheaper (if at all). > What kind of switch is required? not sure if you need a switch. if you do; they're kind of pricey, tho. I think about $900 for the 4-port Netgear ones. (I could be fairly far off there, too). > What's the difference between a switch and a hub? switch routes traffic from port to port (at the Ethernet level, as opposed to a router which routes at the IP level). hub just broadcasts everything to everybody. > What's the actual transfer rate you can achieve? the FreeBSD folks claim 900Mbit/s (or about 120MB/s [their math]). Linux is a bit slower than that, but not outrageously so. You probably won't see the difference. > If someone is familiar with this, could you send me some part numbers I > can look-up? go to Netgear's web site. my advice would be to give it a try with a couple of 100base-T cards and a crossover cable; and see if that works well enough. odds on, it will. if it's not enough; then try GigE. unless you're dead-set on the *coolness* of GigE. :) Carl Soderstrom. -- Network Engineer Real-Time Enterprises (952) 943-8700