FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Farallon Announces High Bandwidth Networking Solutions
– New 24-port dual speed hub plus 8-port palm-sized 10/100 switch
– Now shipping, Gigabit Ethernet card for Macintosh and Windows

SAN LEANDRO, Calif., June 21st, 1999 – Farallon Communications, Inc.,
developer of reliable, plug-and-play networking solutions for Macs
and PCs, today announced their new Fast Starlet 24-port dual speed
hub, a high-density companion to Farallon’s popular 8-port dual speed
hub. In addition, Farallon introduced a palm-sized 8-port 10/100
switch at a great low price and announced the availability of their
Gigabit Ethernet card with Mac OS and Windows NT drivers. “Our
customers are concerned about two things, lower cost and better
performance,” states Ken Alan, Farallon Product Manager. “Todays
announcement shows that we are listening to our customers and
responding to their needs.”

Farallons Fast Starlet Dual Speed Hub/24

Ideal for high-density Fast Ethernet environments where existing 10Mb
devices, such as printers or older workstations, cannot be upgraded
economically? the Fast Starlet Dual Speed Hub/24 is a perfect,
low-cost solution for schools and businesses looking to integrate
Ethernet with Fast Ethernet. Farallons Fast Starlet Dual Speed
Hub/24 features:
– 24 10/100Base-TX Ethernet ports plus one crossover uplink port for
maximum flexibility.
– N-Way auto-negotiation for automatic 10Base-T or 100Base-TX selection.

– Support for all standard Ethernet protocols including TCP/IP,
AppleTalk & IPX.
– Rack mountable with at-a-glance LEDs & auto-partitioning of faulty
network segments.
– Lifetime warranty, free technical support & universal power supply.

Farallons Fast Starlet Palm Switch 10/100

Ideal for use in classrooms, labs, libraries or businesses where
improved performance for high bandwidth applications such as desktop
video and publishing is needed, the Fast Starlet Palm Switch 10/100
is a compact 8-port N-way auto-negotiating switched hub that provides
affordable high-performance switched Fast Ethernet to the desktop.
Farallons Fast Starlet Palm Switch 10/100 also allows users to
integrate older 10Base-T devices, such as printers, with a 100Base-T
network as they upgrade. The Fast Starlet Palm Switch 10/100 features:
– 8 10/100Base-TX switched Ethernet ports with a shared uplink port for
ultimate flexibility.
– Full duplex support for connections up to 200Mbps of bandwidth per
port.
– N-Way auto-negotiation for automatic 10Base-T or 100Base-TX selection.

– Key holes for wall mounting & front panel LEDs for at-a-glance
monitoring.
– Support for all standard Ethernet protocols including TCP/IP,
AppleTalk & IPX.
– 3 year warranty, universal power supply & free technical support.

Farallons Gigabit PCI Card

Now shipping, the Farallon Gigabit PCI Card provides much faster
access to file servers than 100Mb Fast Ethernet, reducing the time
users spend waiting for network tasks to complete. “We tested the
Farallon Gigabit Card extensively during its entire beta cycle and
found the card’s performance in both low level and real world tests
to be impressive,” states Bob Kridle, President of Xinet. “During
beta, we established peak performance at 123Mbps in a real-world
environment with our FullPress Server Software running on a
high-speed SUN Server. That’s 100% faster than the performance we’ve
seen with Farallon’s Fast EtherTX-10/100 PCI Card.”

Kridle adds, “To our end users time is money, so if there are
solutions that will allow them to decrease the total time it takes to
complete a prepress job they will deploy it.” Farallons Gigabit PCI
card features:
– 1000Base-SX fiber-optic port for gigabit connectivity.
– Mac & PC drivers for cross-platform gigabit in desktops & servers
– IEEE 802.3z standards for full protocol compatibility.
– Full-duplex support for optimal network performance.
– Jumbo frames compatibility allows card to accept extended Ethernet
packets from other workstations without interruption.
– Built-in interrupt coalescing, flexible buffer alignment and TCP/IP
checksum offload minimizes CPU’s involvement in network activity.
– Adaptive interrupt frequency maximizes network performance.
– Status LEDs for at-a-glance monitoring.
– Free technical support & 3 year warranty.

Helmut Tschemernjak of HELIOS Software, Germany, tested the Farallon
Gigabit PCI Card with a Lantest 30MB file and a G3/400 Mac via a
Foundry switch to a Linux or Sun server. The file write speed was 28
MB/sec and the read speed 17 MB/sec. “I have never seen a Mac this
fast on the network,” exclaimed Tschemernjak.

Pricing & Availability

– Fast Starlet Dual Speed Hub/24 [PN940/24]
Now shipping
US Estimated Street Price $629.00

– Fast Starlet Palm Switch 10/100 [PN981]
Shipping Early July
US Estimated Street Price $299.00

– Farallon Gigabit PCI Card [PN9000-SX]
Now Shipping
US Estimated Street Price $949.00

Farallon products are available through major distributors and
resellers worldwide. Farallon offers a complete line of reliable,
plug-and-play Ethernet and Fast Ethernet cards, adapters, hubs and
switches. For more information visit http://www.farallon.com/products.

About Farallon Communications, Inc.

Founded in 1986, Farallon develops and markets reliable,
plug-and-play networking products designed to simplify networking
through innovation. With over 8 million customers worldwide, Farallon
is dedicated to providing complete, easy-to-use networking solutions
and world-class technical support to the Education, Home, Small
Business and Publishing communities. Further information can be
obtained via phone 510.346.8000, web (http://www.farallon.com) or
email (mailto:info@farallon.com). Farallon is an affiliate of Gores
Technology Group, a worldwide high technology business management
company. The Farallon headquarters are in San Leandro, California,
with a European office in the UK.