Hi,
I develop embedded software for a living. We need to instrument the bidirectional serial interface between our product and a daughterboard (containing its own microprocessor) so that we can have another piece of software (which we write to run under XP or Vista) examine the serial communication and look for logical errors.
It would seem most convenient for us to use two of those cheap USB->Serial adapters and just wire them up so that only the receive portion is used. One of the adapters would monitor the communication from our product to the daughterboard, and the second adapter would monitor communication going in the other direction.
Questions:
a)Is there a better approach (especially recognizing that we want maximum portability and that very few laptops these days ship with one let alone two serial ports)?
b)Will Windows keep up with 2 streams at 19,200 baud?
c)Are there any web pages that you've found especially helpful? I did find this one:
Is this the correct API to use?
d)Are there any books or additional resources on this topic that you'd recommend?
e)Our boards work at 3V, but I think serial communication is 12V by specification. If anyone is aware of a commercial level-shifter so that we don't need to build one ...
Thanks sincerely for the help, The Lizard