From: David Stevens <dlstevens@us.ibm.com> Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2002 23:55:35 -0700 I believe the very large BSD number was based on the large granularity of the timer (500ms for slowtimeout), designed for use on a VAX 780. The PC on my desk is 3500 times faster than a VAX 780, and you can send a lot of data on Gigabit Ethernet instead of sitting on your hands for an enormous min timeout on modern hardware. Switched gigabit isn't exactly the same kind of environment as shared 10 Mbps (or 2 Mbps) when that stuff went in, but the min timeouts are the same. This is well understood, the problem is that BSD's coarse timers are going to cause all sorts of problems when a Linux stack with a reduced MIN RTO talks to it. Consider also, delayed ACKs and possible false retransmits this could induce with a smaller MIN RTO. - : send the line "unsubscribe linux-net" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html