EtherLite 160 connection limitation?

Serial Servers & Infrastructure Mangement Portserver TS
1

I am trying to use the EtherLite 160 in my Cisco classroom. Each student will connect to the box using the driver loaded on their machines. Student A would connect to COM3, Student B would connect to COM4, etc.

In testing this, I am finding that only 6 or 7 computers can establish TCP connections to the EtherLite box. All other computers get stuck on SYN_SENT (as per TCPView).

Is this a hardware limitation? Firmware? Maybe just a tweak needs to be made to the firmware? I need a bit of help.

By the way, I was easily able to open all 12 sessions on a single computer with no problems at all, but this does not work for my needs.

EtherLite 160, Firmware 1.6, no virtual ports set.

2

You are correct, this is a hardware/firmware limitation. Please refer to the following KnowledgeBase article for details:

http://search2.digi.com/support/kbaseresultdetl.jsp?id=526

3

Oh no! This means this box will not work for my needs!

Does Digi have any kind of trade-up/upgrade policy? I have already invested too much time and energy to stop.

4

If you’ve purchased within 30 days, call your reseller. Otherwise, contact Digi Inside Sales at 952-912-3444.

5

By the way, the Portserver TS8 or Portserver TS16 can support up to 20 concurrent socket connections.

Alternate solutions might be to use a number of Etherlites which will suit your purpose, or use a Portserver TS8 or TS16 instead. The Portserver TS line of products uses the same Realport driver as the Etherlite does.

6

Additionally, our “Portserver TS” product line would work fine in this situation.