[TenTec] OT: Programming Cheap Chinese Handhelds

[Rick - DJ0IP / NJ0IP]

EXCELLENT information, Geoff.

I bought my Wouxon nearly 4 years ago and there was hardly any info
available at the time.
The problem now, there is too much information.

I think the key here is to buy a cable that comes with a driver.  Then it
doesn't matter if it is a clone or an original Prolific.
But as I said, mine did not come with a WIN8 driver. 
I have WIN7 on the computer I programmed with.

And yes, my driver (for WIN7) was called something like Vista_WIN7 (hi).
I wondered why they had such a funny name for it.
You just explained why.  TNX!

Perhaps I'll install this stuff on my ham radio computer (which runs XP) and
try my cheap clone (driverless) cable again.

73 - Rick, DJ0IP
(Nr. Frankfurt am Main)


-----Original Message-----
From: TenTec [mailto:tentec-bounces at contesting.com] On Behalf Of geoffrey
mendelson
Sent: Monday, September 08, 2014 7:15 AM
To: Discussion of Ten-Tec Equipment
Subject: Re: [TenTec] OT: Programming Cheap Chinese Handhelds

On 9/8/2014 7:52 AM, Rick - DJ0IP / NJ0IP wrote:
>
> The easy solution is to buy your cable either with a Baofeng or Wouxon 
> label on it.
> That way you get a good cable with a matching driver.
> Perhaps this should be common sense but I didn't realize there were 
> clones being sold as originals.
>
Baofeng does not sell cables. Nor AFAIK does Wouxon. The Baofeng cables sold
by Chinese vendors are just cheap cables they just happen to  sell with the
radio. They all have a counterfeit PROLIFIC USB to serial bridge chip in
them.

These chips work fine with the regular Prolific drivers for Windows XP (and
most are listed as XP only cables). There are Windows VISTA drivers that
work with and there are later ones that do not. Windows 7 requires the
earlier VISTA drivers. Linux works fine with all of them.

This is well documented on the UV-5R Yahoo groups FAQ file and the web page
they tell every new user to go to. A link is included at the bottom of every
post.
The web page has instructions on how to determine which chip you have, what
drivers you need,  download links, and how to prevent Windows from replacing
them with broken drivers.

I believe KENWOOD actually sells cables with legitimate chips in them, but
they cost about $100 and you never really know until you receive it what it
is.

The other option is to buy a USB to RS-232 adapter with either a real
Prolific chip, an FTDI bridge chip, or a Silicon Labs Cp2102 bridge chip.
You then connect it to an RS-232 Kenwood type cable.

The cheapest option is to spend $2 and buy a CP2102 based USB to TTL serial
converter, 2 matching plugs, and run the 3 wires to them. :-)

Geoff.

--
Geoffrey S. Mendelson 4X1GM/N3OWJ
Jerusalem Israel.

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