SyGate Internet Sharing
Software
Last updated: 10/27/99
BOTTOM LINE. SyGate costs $39.95
for a three-connection license. Other licensing plans are available. If
you have Windows 98 SE and you occasionally want to share a dial-up
between two or three home PC's, to browse the Internet, send and receive
E-Mail, and download software, than ICS will do the job. However, SyGate
will certainly do the same job better, faster, and probably with less hassle. If
you don't have Win 98 SE and you are thinking of buying the upgrade for ICS,
then I recommend spending the money on SyGate. It is a superior product. If
you plan to do fancier things on the Internet, such as conferencing and playing
games, then SyGate may be the only reasonable alternative. SyGate is
clearly the best choice of the Internet-sharing products mentioned to date
in the Digest for a Small Office/Home Office (SOHO) environment, especially
one with an NT Server.
NOTES.
Click here for
a good write-up of SyGate features
SyGate will demand dial a MODEM connected
to a SyGate Server when clients need to connect to the Internet. In
fact, in our configuration, the browser-based MODEM interface is available
on the Server and Client computers, and the MODEM can be controlled from
any of the PCs on the network.
Software environment: SyGate 3.01, NT 4.0
with SP 5, Win 98, and Win 98 SE
Unlike Windows 98 SE ICS, SyGate does not
stick a lot of junk in the Windows Network Configuration display.
The SyGate Server runs as a service on Windows
NT. It will startup automatically, if desired, and support clients
on the network without having to log on to NT.
SyGate has very clean uninstall--it leaves
nothing behind and cleans-out the relevant windows registry entries like
it should.
SyGate will not work with internal one-way
cable MODEMs used in conjunction with separate dial-MODEMs. it will
work with an external one-way cable MODEM with an integral dial-up MODEM,
such as the Surfboard
SB2100D used in our configuration.
Two NICs (network adapters) are required in
the SyGate server when using an external cable MODEM, one for the MODEM and
another for the LAN.
I tested SyGate with a pure dial-up connection
and got very good results.
A trial version of SyGate is available for download.
Larry
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