CORRECTION : USB to serial ADAPTOR and serial to HP48 or HP49 cables

[Herve Chappe]

Hello HP gurus,
I have inherited of an old IBM NetVista PC, and I run both Windows 2000
Pro and Windows XP on it. A great machine ! Unfortunately, the machine
has no serial port, instead it has a lot of USB ports - I presume USB
1.1. I am considering to acquire an USB to serial ADAPTOR to connect my
fafourite HP 48and HP49 calcs. The money is not the issue, the thing is
cheap. I just wonder if anyone has any experience with those adaptors,
either for HP48, or HP49, under W2K or XP... Any feedback will be welcome.
Best regards and many thank's to all supporters on this NG,
Herve

[Colin Croft]

I don't know if it will help but I've used them on a number of computers
using a 39G. This suffers the same problem of needing a comm port with
many computers not having them. I put info on my website for other users
with the same problem.
See http://www.hphomeview.com/Tips/USB%20to%20Serial%20Converters.pdf

[Jean-Yves Avenard]

Colin Croft wrote:
> I don't know if it will help but I've used them on a number of computers
> using a 39G. This suffers the same problem of needing a comm port with
> many computers not having them. I put info on my website for other users
> with the same problem.
> See http://www.hphomeview.com/Tips/USB%20to%20Serial%20Converters.pdf
>

Hello Colin

Just a quick note about your documentation. This is a very good one, I
wished HP published that on their site.

What you describe as a parallel port isn't.
This is still a serial port but a DB25 connector. So the extra adapter
required is a DB25 to DB9.

If people go and ask for a parallel to serial port adapter they are
likely to find ... nothing.

Hope this will help
Jean-Yves

[Herve Chappe]

Thank's a lot, Colin, this is indeed a great document !
Herve

[Colin Croft]

Thanks. I'll fix that reference and re-place it soon.

[hpsolo]

I recently purchased a USB to DB9 converter from Radio Shack. It works
fine under Windows XP, as well as Linux. There are Windows drivers that
come on the included CDROM. To use it under linux, you simply need to
load the pl2303 driver. Anyway, I have the serial cable for the HP48G
series (4 pin <-> 9 pin) which I hook up to the adapater and have had
no problems whatsoever.

[hpsolo]

Oh, here is a link for it:

http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=26-183

[hpsolo]

Almost forgot, I have only used this to do transfers from PC (USB) to
HP48GX (4-PIN) using the adapater and the original serial cable. I do
not know whether or not it will work with an HP49 or HP49+ models.

[christian_ab]

http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp%3Fcatalog%255Fname%3DCTLG%26product%255Fid%3D26-183

>Almost forgot, I have only used this to do transfers from PC (USB) to
>HP48GX (4-PIN) using the adapater and the original serial cable. I do
>not know whether or not it will work with an HP49 or HP49+ models.

In my opinion, if you connect this cable to the HP49G+ it will not work
directly without a special driver or software modification.
The Rs232 <--> USB cable is an Slave USB device, the HP49G+ is Slave
too.
I think you need some kind of driver to let the HP49G+ act as an USB
Master (like your computer does)

[Colin Croft]

I've updated the document to correct the error you pointed out and to
make it clearer in a few places. The link is the same.

[Brandon Del Bel]

You could also get a PCI card with parallel and serial ports. This is
what I ended up doing when I discovered the motherboard I bought lacked
these.

[manjo]

> You could also get a PCI card with parallel and serial ports. This is
> what I ended up doing when I discovered the motherboard I bought lacked
> these.

But of course,
...however USB to SERIAL adapters seem to be
less hardware involved as well as more universal solution for both
desktop PC's as well as Laptop and Pannel PC's

regards,
manjo