PCMCIA serial port card

Hi Sam - Once again, eBay buyers who don't know any better are getting ripped off. That's twice what they should cost.

Oops - sorry, missed the part about the 'PCMCIA' / laptop. So those prices don't look so bad after all.

Sorry, I don't have one or I'd let you have it.

Eiger serial card

$50+shipping, twice eBay prices.

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It's one of those things that was never very popular because few people needed more than one serial port on a laptop and these days serial ports are pretty much dead for most people. You might be best off getting one from ebay, I've never even seen one up close and I've got a lot of random computer bits.

Got USB ports on that laptop? How about a serial-to-USB adapter?

Sorry, this is a dinosaur - but a useful dinosur though since it servces my needs in controlling lasers and data acquisition widgets.

What about a parallel to serial port converter? :)

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I'm assuming you already have one serial port - I've seen a project online where a guy converted an old unneeded pcmcia modem into a serial card for his sony vaio, which had no ports at all.

Lots of old card modems lying around now I reckon... could be an interesting project!

Alex

When somebody suggested few had ever been interested in a PCMIA serial port, my reaction was that likely people did add things that bypassed the need for a serial port. Your suggestion reinforces that, since likely people would be more interested in adding a modem than just a serial port.

On the other hand, it may be that the vintage is too late. Ten years ago, I took an ISA 2400Baud modem and yanked the UART, adding some line drivers and receivers so I had a 2400 Baud serial modem to use with my Mac.

I would have duplicated the process with a faster modem later, but by then there was no standalone UART. It was part of some LSI IC, and there was no way of accessing the needed points.

Michael

Yes, one DB9 serial port and an internal modem that I think is COM2.

I need COM3 or higher.

A Sony VAIO would be another possibility - I have the port replicator but alas, that only provides a single serial port!

But this KIWI dinosaur would be much more appropriate as it's so ancient as to have no other good use.

That's a thought - I've got plenty old PCMCIA modems myself. But even if I only value my time at minimum wage, it's going to be more than for one from eBay! :)

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A lot of pmcia serial card and especially usb to serial cards wont work for all applications.

The Eigar serial port works like an original port, and drivers are available for Dos and Windows. I f you have a dinosaur application, you may need it to work in DOS. Ray

At least one of the applications is genuinely Windows compatible. :)

The other is a terminal emulator and while I'm currently using an ancient copy of Procomm Plus, and terminal emulator that has certain terminal types included in its database will be fine. But since COM1 can be the built in port, that really doesn't matter.

--- sam | Sci.Electronics.Repair FAQ:

Important: Anything sent to the email address in the message header above is ignored unless my full name is included in the subject line. Or, you can contact me via the Feedback Form in the FAQs.