On Mon, Jul 25, 2005 at 07:48:51PM -0400, Ron Notarius wrote:
> How hard would it be to implement a small box that would convert the RS-232
> port to a USB port in such a way that it would emulate the original port for
> the newer computer systems?
There are such devices on the market. They plug into your USB port and
have standard 9 pin RS-232 output. In my original email, I questioned
using them because they may be susceptible to RF. Looking back on that,
if there was demand, someone would buy them, put them in little metal
boxes, isolate them with capacitors and ferrite chokes and sell them
on you know where. :-)
On the other hand Ten-Tec could by the opposite chips, USB to serial (with
TTL outputs) and interface them right into the OII. On windows it would
take a modification of the standard USB serial device driver (easily done).
Then people writing software would open a device called "\\orion" instead
of "\\com1" and things would work.
Linux and MacOS are even easier, it just requires a table change.
HP did that with many scanners and printers. They took parallel port devices
(remember parallel ports?) removed the parallel interface itself and
replaced them with USB to parallel converters "under the hood".
BTW, I talking only about the way data gets to and from the radio, not
the command set or responses. There is no reason I see for major changes
there.
What would be really nice would be to allow the device number to change
via a jumper or control panel option. Then you could have more than one
radio on the same computer.
73,
Geoff.
--
Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel gsm@mendelson.com N3OWJ/4X1GM
IL Voice: (077)-424-1667 IL Fax: 972-2-648-1443 U.S. Voice: 1-215-821-1838
VoN Skype: mendelsonfamily. Looking for work as a CTO or consultant in
handheld gaming, large systems development, handheld device construction, etc.
Support amateur (ham) radio, boycott Google!!!
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