Post by thread:[EE] USB to serial port compatibility

I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same quality (more or less). Mainly I don't want to go through a dozen different adapters to figure out that there's only one which will work. -forrest

On 30 Jun 2008 at 21:16, Forrest W Christian wrote: > I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a > digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other > things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, > RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. > > I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one > specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same quality > (more or less). > > Mainly I don't want to go through a dozen different adapters to figure > out that there's only one which will work. I personally have stuck to the Bafo BF-810 / 812 ones which use the Prolific chip (PL-23xx?) and they have served me well. Recently tried one on Vista and it works ok, noticed it even tells you in the little pop up dialog box what COM port it gets assigned to, nice ~ quite a pain previously, not sure if it's the latest driver that is responsible for this or Vista itself. They don't work with everythting though - my weather station for example, but I don't blame the converter for this. -- Brent Brown, Electronic Design Solutions 16 English Street, St Andrews, Hamilton 3200, New Zealand Ph: +64 7 849 0069 Fax: +64 7 849 0071 Cell: +64 27 433 4069 eMail: spam_OUTbrent.brownTakeThisOuTclear.net.nz

Brent Brown wrote: {Quote hidden}> On 30 Jun 2008 at 21:16, Forrest W Christian wrote: > >> I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a >> digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other >> things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, >> RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. >> >> I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one >> specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same quality >> (more or less). >> >> Mainly I don't want to go through a dozen different adapters to figure >> out that there's only one which will work. > > I personally have stuck to the Bafo BF-810 / 812 ones which use the Prolific chip > (PL-23xx?) and they have served me well. Recently tried one on Vista and it works > ok, noticed it even tells you in the little pop up dialog box what COM port it gets > assigned to, nice ~ quite a pain previously, not sure if it's the latest driver that is > responsible for this or Vista itself. > > They don't work with everythting though - my weather station for example, but I > don't blame the converter for this. > Curious, what is the output voltage for these? +/-5V? Or do they not use a voltage inverter supply and only provide 0-5V?

{Quote hidden}> >> I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a > >> digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other > >> things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, > >> RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. > >> > >> I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one > >> specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same quality > >> (more or less). > >> > >> Mainly I don't want to go through a dozen different adapters to figure > >> out that there's only one which will work. > > > > I personally have stuck to the Bafo BF-810 / 812 ones which use the Prolific chip > > (PL-23xx?) and they have served me well. Recently tried one on Vista and it works > > ok, noticed it even tells you in the little pop up dialog box what COM port it gets > > assigned to, nice ~ quite a pain previously, not sure if it's the latest driver that is > > responsible for this or Vista itself. > > > > They don't work with everythting though - my weather station for example, but I > > don't blame the converter for this. > > > > Curious, what is the output voltage for these? +/-5V? Or do they not use > a voltage inverter supply and only provide 0-5V? I just measured them... the older BF-810 approx +/-9.5V, the newer BF-812 approx +/-6.5V, no load. -- Brent Brown, Electronic Design Solutions 16 English Street, St Andrews, Hamilton 3200, New Zealand Ph: +64 7 849 0069 Fax: +64 7 849 0071 Cell: +64 27 433 4069 eMail: .....brent.brownKILLspam@spam@clear.net.nz

> I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a > digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other > things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, > RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. I sell adapters (prolific chip) that seem to work well with most thingies, but Olin once tested this adapter with his progger and it did *not* work. So for the ProProg you'd better check with Olin. -- Wouter van Ooijen -- ------------------------------------------- Van Ooijen Technische Informatica: http://www.voti.nl consultancy, development, PICmicro products docent Hogeschool van Utrecht: http://www.voti.nl/hvu

I have a bunch of adapters with different chipsets and I use them mostly on my MacBookPro under Mac OSX and WinXP via Bootcamp (not virtualization). I have settled on two types of adapters that seem to have worked for everything I have tried so far. (1) any adapter with the FTDI FT232 family of chips I have three different adapters made by Parallax that all work well as well as some FTDI made end products, and some "Brand X" products designed around FTDI chips, all work well in both OS's with no gotchas (2) I bought a cheapie "iConcepts" USB-232 adapter based upon the PL2303 chipset. I had a little trouble tracking down the Mac OSX drivers, but I got them. This unit too runs fine under all apps I use under both OS's. I picked up another cheap unit that doesn't even have a name on it at a flea market and it turned out to be a Pl2303 compatible and it runs just fine as well. My apps, include programming PICs (PICStart+), Arduino, Wiring, Basic Stamps, PICAXE's, AVRs. I use them with ham radio programs to program and or control radio equipment. The only thing that none of these will handle are the primitive PIC programmers that flag the DTR/RTS/CTS lines to program PICs, USB timing is terrible for that snf it just won't work ... but then, I have had my PICStart+ for 6 years and have never needed the other kind! cheers ... bbr On Jun 30, 2008, at 11:16 PM, Forrest W Christian wrote: {Quote hidden}> I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a > digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of > other > things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of > course, > RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. > > I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one > specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same > quality > (more or less). > > Mainly I don't want to go through a dozen different adapters to figure > out that there's only one which will work. > > -forrest > --

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 1:50 PM, Wouter van Ooijen <wouterKILLspamvoti.nl> wrote: >> I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a >> digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of other >> things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and of course, >> RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. > > I sell adapters (prolific chip) that seem to work well with most > thingies, but Olin once tested this adapter with his progger and it did > *not* work. So for the ProProg you'd better check with Olin. >From what I hear (in the Linux usb forum) Prolific is problematic. FTDI chip based converter are better. But it seems to me most of the cheaper USB to serial cables are based on Prolific chips. Personally I am using a FTDI based cable but I seldom use it. My desktop has two real serial ports. My notebook at work (Dell Latitude D610) has one as well. The other notebook I use for lab work in the company (Latitude D620) has a real serial port as well. Xiaofan

Forrest W Christian wrote: > I need to purchase a couple of USB to RS-232 adapters... One for a > digital scale and one for Olin's ProProg.. I've got a couple of > other things coming as well which will need RS-232 for as well, and > of course, RS-232 ports are becoming extinct. > > I was wondering if anyone has enough experience to recommend one > specific adapter over another or if they are all about the same > quality (more or less). I tried the one Wouter sells a couple of years ago or so. At first it didn't work, but after figuring out the chip manufacturer, digging around on their web site, and installing a updated driver, it worked fine with the ProProg. The chip manufacturer was "Prolific" if I remember right. If you ever need additional programmers, check out the USBProg (http://www.embedinc.com/products). It uses USB natively and costs less than the ProProg. ******************************************************************** Embed Inc, Littleton Massachusetts, http://www.embedinc.com/products (978) 742-9014. Gold level PIC consultants since 2000.

Wouter van Ooijen wrote: > I sell adapters (prolific chip) that seem to work well with most > thingies, but Olin once tested this adapter with his progger and it > did > *not* work. So for the ProProg you'd better check with Olin. It did work after installing a updated driver. ******************************************************************** Embed Inc, Littleton Massachusetts, http://www.embedinc.com/products (978) 742-9014. Gold level PIC consultants since 2000.

Olin Lathrop wrote: > I tried the one Wouter sells a couple of years ago or so. At first it > didn't work, but after figuring out the chip manufacturer, digging around on > their web site, and installing a updated driver, it worked fine with the > ProProg. The chip manufacturer was "Prolific" if I remember right. From this and other threads, it sounds like these are the most common... and seem to work - which seems to make the odds better than I would have suspected. > If you ever need additional programmers, check out the USBProg > (http://www.embedinc.com/products). It uses USB natively and costs less > than the ProProg. We're using this in production and the pushbutton is worth the additional $220, plus the additional hassle of using a USB "dongle". In fact, it looks like I'm going to end up thunking down something like $1K for a Xeltek superpro 3000u for non-pic programming for the exact same reason. -forrest