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On Fri, Apr 18, 2008 at 07:13:25PM +0100, peter green wrote:
> Herbert Graf wrote:
> > Cool! Any idea how the interface is meant to be done?
> >
> >   
> It looks like linux has a built in SPI subsystem. Presumablly you can 
> use any SPI controller that has a driver for that subsystem.
> 
> Though frankly I don't see much point. Most processors with the power to 
> run linux probablly also have far quicker interfaces to put an ethernet 
> controller on.

It's about flexibility. The ENC28J60 can run at up to 20mhz. Sure it's
not 100mbase-T, but if you don't need blazing speed why bother with all
the engineering time to implement a faster solution. There's some stuff
SPI gets you as well, you could for instance build up a 32 port switch
using one ENC28J60 for each port. Sure you could do that faster in an
FPGA, but that solution sounds a lot easier to whip up to me.

Besides, it's the only ethernet controller chip that you can order from
digikey as far as I know...

- -- 
peter[:-1]@petertodd.org http://petertodd.org
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