[Trlog] SETCOMM Using PCI Serial / LPT Cards with TRLog (Yes you can!)

[Matthew George]

I have had several questions about the SetComm utility I wrote back in
1999.

I have updated the utility to handle LPT ports.

The following text is from my previous posts regarding this utility.  I
hope the TRLog community continues to find SetComm useful.  You can
download the utility at ftp://nc7j.qrq.com/trlog/setcomm.zip (if you
have trouble getting the zip file, send me a note and I'll email it to
you ASAP)

de Max NG7M

Below is a post I made to the list back in April of 1999.  I wrote a DOS
utility in C that will let you use non-standard I/O addresses with
TRLog.  It basically rewrites (temporarily) the memory address where the
4 standard serial port I/O addresses are.  The PCI serial card I bought
back in 1999 Byterunner PCI-800(8 ports) works just fine with TRLog...
so I have to chuckle every time I see a TRLog post that claims you can't
use PCI serial cards with TRLog. ;)

The message is below and the link to download the utility is still good.
Read the instructions carefully.  It has worked really well for me.  Let
me know if it works out for you... I get pretty busy, so it's tough to
spend large amounts of time figuring out if the utility will work with
every XYZ PCI/ISA multi serial port card in the world...

Best Regards de NG7M

If anyone is interested, I have created a DOS utility program which
allows you to changes the Serial Base I/O addresses that TRLog uses for
Serial Ports 1 - 4 and LPT ports 1 - 3.

Q. Why would I need this utility?

A. If you have a Mutli Port PCI/ISA Serial card that uses non-standard
Serial Base I/O ports, and you want to configure TRLog to use the ports
on one of these cards, this little utility will allow you to use your
serial card with TRLog.

If you are interested in my experience with a PCI 8 Port Serial card and
TRLog, keep reading...  if you are not interested, don't waste your time
with the rest of this message. ;)

I currently have 10 serial ports in my PC and I can use every single one
of them at the same time with no interrupt conflicts. (BTW, TRLog does
not use interrupts as most of you know).

I have two standard serial ports built into my mother board:

Serial Port 1 using interrupt 4 and Base I/O 3f8 (standard config)
Serial Port 2 using interrupt 3 and Base I/O 2f8 (standard config)

The next 8 serial ports are on a VSCom PCI Controller, model PCI-800.
This card can be purchased for $179.00 (US) at
http://www.byterunnder.com  This card uses and shares one interrupt
across all 8 ports.  It works really well in Windows 98 (on my system)
and in DOS.  There are drivers for Windows NT and Linux too (I haven't
tried the card in Windows NT or Linux however).  The card comes with an
octopus cable that fans out to 8 DB25 male connectors, each connector is
about 3 feet long and I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the
card and cable.  I know there are other cards that will do the same
thing, but this is the one that worked for me.  I supply the above
information with obviously no benefit to me.

When I got ready to try the ports on the PCI-800 with TRLog, I quickly
found out that TRLog reads the I/O addresses for Serial Ports 1 - 4 from
the BIOS of the computer... this posed a problem for my new PCI-800
card.  The PCI-800 uses non-standard I/O ports for each port.  For
example, on my machine the card is using dc00 for the first port and
dc10 for the second port etc... TRLog sees Serial Port 1 at address 3f8,
setcomm will make TRLog see what ever address you want for Serial Ports
1,2,3 and 4.  After I run setcomm, TRLog will see dc00 as the I/O
address for Serial Port 1, etc...

The only way to get TRLog to use these ports was to go into debug and
modify the memory addresses for the serial port addresses.  This was a
major pain, so I decided to write a little utility to do the work for
me... setcomm was born! :)

I programmed this utility in a few hours a couple days ago and I thought
I would share it with everyone in case someone else has the same card or
has run into this problem with another multi port serial card.  This is
NOT a TSR utility, it just temporarily changes/rewrites the I/O port
address in memory.  After you reboot, the addresses will get set back to
normal.

The utility is called setcomm.exe and you can download it from:
ftp://nc7j.qrq.com/trlog/SETCOMM.EXE

SETCOMM.EXE has a usage help screen and it should be obvious how to use
it once you have downloaded it.  It basically will change the I/O
addresses that TRLog sees for serial ports 1 - 4 (temporarily).

This card has solved all the serial port problems that I have ever
had... I have one card now that can supply up to 6 serial ports to TRLog
(ports 5 and 6 in TRLog allow you to specify non-standard I/O
addresses).  No interrupts are used, and it only uses one PCI slot in my
PC.  I can also mix and match my standard serial ports on my
motherboard... it really has been the 'golden ring' of serial cards....
your mileage may vary! :)

Anyway, I hope someone finds this utility useful with the multi port
serial cards that are out there...  If you have any questions, let me
know.

mg NG7M