Web Server Packed into RJ45 Connector

VinceTronics writes "Electronic Design magazine has a review (.pdf) of the XPort by Lantronix, a product that packs an entire web server into the volume of an RJ45 connector! This includes an 80186 controller, an OS, the TCP/IP stack, a 10/100 Ethernet transceiver, and the LAN interface magnetics. Downside is that the serial interface to the controller tops out at 300 kbps, but for $33 (in 10K quantities) it's a cool, easy way to net-enable just about anything."

Comments

Re:Great!

[OneEyedApe]

It sounds like that is what this is designed for.

These seem cool

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, a lot of these devices seem cool (and I'll agree that they are), but to me and others in my line of work they're a security nightmare. Due to the small size, it's not hard build a device that could be hidden inside of a building on a network leaving it open to the person who left it there.

I'd still love to have one to play around with, though!

Not that big of a downside...

[heldlikesound]

Downside is that the serial interface to the controller tops out at 300 kbps

This seems doesn't seem like that big of a deal, for the kind of appications this is targeted for (security system modules, refrigerators, answering machines, etc...) I'd think 300 kbps is more than adaquate, you can even do some streaming video, with a reasonable bit-rate.

Re:No big deal...

[RupW]

I used to have an ear ring that could run seti@home.

Point is consumer electronics manufacturers can use it to internet enable their devices at very low R&D cost.

Assuming, that is, they're willing to bump the retail price by $30 - $50.

Which they won't be. Until there's *serious* demand for this stuff.

Forget about stealth Dreamcasts!

[Gudlyf]

In a previous article, there was talk about the possibility of hackers placing small Dreamcasts on corporate networks for packet sniffing and whatnot. If they can make a webserver as small as an RJ45 connector, what's stopping someone from making one that can spy on the network?

If somehow someone puts one of those in your network closet (or heck, anywhere on the network), good luck finding it -- it's a connector for godsakes!

Re:I'm wondering

[cdrudge]

Embedded systems. Put one in your toaster, fridge, hair dryer, internal diagnostics on your TV, spa, whatever. It's not meant to be a webserver for a high bandwidth website, but more for controlling some device via a web interface.

Re:I'm wondering

[e8johan]

Anything embeddable sells in tens of thousands. Stationary computers are the least produced computer type. Just imagine all microcontrollers in VCRs for example. I'd say that there are far more than 10000 VCRs sold each year. Now embedd a webserver into each VCR, so that you can program the timer over your private LAN. Thats a possible 10000 units. Now put the same protocol in your digital TV reciever/decoder to change channels, update codes, subscribe to PPV shows etc. and let the VCR change the channel of the decoder and you've got another 10k units.

10k is a small number in the embedded world.

Now, for the real price:
"The list price of the XPort is $49.00. Discount pricing on the XPort is also available in volumes of ten thousand."
according to http://www.lantronix.com/news/pr/2003/02-24-xport. html

Re:I'm wondering

[walt-sjc]

At $33 each in quantity, I don't think we are going to see them in toasters anytime soon.

As far as embedded systems goes, this is an order of magnitude or so too expensive. Manufacturers pinch pennies on even larger items like TV's, as each dollar increase in cost translates into something like $5 to the consumer, and potentially millions to the bottom line.

Frankly, this technology isn't even appropriate anyway. For something more in line with the applications you are thinking about, look here where the technology is already imbedded in millions of consumer devices.

Re:Great!

[Fembot]

Yeah but Ironicly theres no mention of IPv6 in that pdf anywhere that I can see....

Pulls over 200 mills!

[rabryn]

This is a great product but it pulls over 200 mills, not so great for low power embedded work.

Re:A House of Cables...

[larien]

Hrm, might be off the wall, but how about using the power cable? We already have the ability to do broadband over electricity wires, how about we simply use that technology in the home to web-enable these kind of devices? If a home doesn't have the setup already, no sweat, you just miss out on the extra features. If you do have it, you simply plug in your toaster/freezer/whatever and it gets a DHCP address and it's on the net!

Re:I know I'm gonna get flamed for this...

[TobyWong]

Then don't think of fridges think of ovens. DL a new recipe and the oven will take care of all the temperature adjustments and timing you just put your food in and press 'GO'.

The applications are only limited by your imagination.

HTTP - Nice and Simple

[fastdecade]

Technology likes this really shows off how useful an open, ASCII-based, protocol can be.

Re:HTTP - Nice and Simple

[Anonymous Coward]

Well actually, in my experience, an open -binary- protocol can be implemented faster and in fewer instructions. If you're not fooling around with linebreaks and whitespace, but instead you can say "Read the next 56 bytes into -this- data structure-" and maybe change the byte-order of the numeric data, you save yourself the trouble of parsing the data and checking for syntactic accuracy.

I'm not proposing that HTTP should have been a binary protocol...ASCII is great, but not because it makes it easy to implement. It's easy to understand, to debug, to monitor, to describe, and to share. But not necessarily to write.

Tell Me Something

[aardwolf64]

It's a web server with an RJ45 port. How exactly will that "net-enable just about anything"?

Sure, you can plug a webserver into anything that happens to have an existing RJ45 port, but what use would that be? (Just what I've always wanted... a web server that I can plug into my laptop so I can browse the web at a blazing 300k/sec.)

I want to net-enable my car. Someone tell me how this RJ45 device will allow that. My car doesn't even have an RJ45 port...

Question

[Quill_28]

I fully admit that my understanding of electronics is pretty weak, and I am confused.

I don't get it?
Everyone keeps talking about how you can hook up your toaster, coffee maker, etc. Do these devices have a serial port?
How would one interface with any of these kind of devices unless they had some sort of output interface?

I can see where these might work well with older legacy devices(printers, etc), and you want to be able put them on a network, but I fail to see how they would help in your home.

Enlightment anyone?

Automated home

[fearlezz]

Cool! Just imagine what you can do with that For instance:

• Having your lights switched by the computer
• Your microwave starts making food when crond tells it to
• Log when people ring the doorbell
• Automatically switch off all lights when you press a master switch when leaving the house

I'll bookmark it. If the price ever decreases to less than $30 a piece, I'll consider to buy some.

Re:No big deal...

[DJPenguin]

Um, $20million would buy you about 600,000 of these dealies.

I think they mean $33 each for quantities of 10k or more, not $33 for 10k!!

Good point.

[torpor]

Sorry, but in this business "$30/piece" is *NOT* cheap.

Wake me up when they're selling them at $1 a piece in quantities of 10k, then we'll see a revolution ...

Re:Good point.

[Tackhead]

> This wouldn't appear in a Roper (about a 4% margin), but more likely a Kennmore Elite or Maytag Neptune. A refrigertator with online access to temperature and enegry usage graphs is more likely to be a $3999 SubZero than a $399 GE. The good thing about this product is that as more people use it, pricing will drop and it will work its way down to mid-range products where the margins are thinner.

And more to the point - it allows you to sell $399 fridge without an energy usage graph, or the exact same fridge, but with a CD-ROM and an Ethernet jack, so that you can view the energy graph from your PC, for $699, you've just made $300 on $33 worth of parts. That's a great way for fridgemakers to boost margins too :)

-1 Misinformed: $100 to use that $30 module

[KalvinB]

According to the site it's $100 for the SDK KIT which makes that $30 module useful. The xPort is an all in one solution for $50.

$130 vs $50. SitePlayer is far more expensive and far less attractive as far as the packaging.

Ben

Re:Yes it is a web server

[finkployd]

A web server is more than pushing html out to the internet. A web server is a way of interacting with users in a manner that is meaningful to your business.

You are confusing market-speak with technical terms.

Market-speak - Webserver: A way to meaningfuly interact with your customers and aid in b2b information exchange.

Technical term - Webserver: Software that responds to web browser requests by returning html.

Actually, now that I think about it, your defination of a webserver is actually an "application server" (think tomcat, coldfusion, websphere, etc). Those still require a webserver to serve up the html.

Finkployd

I can see these being used in cars for diagnostics

[Newer Guy]

I can see these being used in cars for diagnostics, as opposed to the propritary interfaces now used. One of these and a wifi would allow car service places to check out your car without you having to actually come into the dealership. Just start up the car and let us have a look at all its parameters over the web. The car could even tell them when something's going wrong or when routine service is coming due. They could also be used this way as/in a form of imbedded theft control device for the vehicle.