fgz@lakart.UUCP (Fred Genoese-Zerbi) (12/02/88)
I am working on a system that would need several (more than two) serial
ports, and would like to base it on the macintosh. I seem to remember
some time ago hearing about a company that was selling Mac II serial
port cards. Are these out on the market? Does anybody know the name
of the company that makes them, or other companies that make similar
cards? Are there any cards like that for the SE? What is the general
price of these cards if they do exist, and is it difficult to
drive the ports in software?
Thanks for the help.
Federico
{mirror, xait, cfisun}!lakart!fgzphil@Apple.COM (Phil Ronzone) (12/03/88)
In article <362@lakart.UUCP> fgz@lakart.UUCP (Fred Genoese-Zerbi) writes: >I am working on a system that would need several (more than two) serial >ports, and would like to base it on the macintosh. I seem to remember >some time ago hearing about a company that was selling Mac II serial >port cards. Are these out on the market? Does anybody know the name >of the company that makes them, or other companies that make similar ... SuperMac in Mt. View CA makes a 4 port serial card. I believe they are selling it for around $500. +------------------------+-----------------------+----------------------------+ | Philip K. Ronzone | A/UX System Architect | APPLELINK: RONZONE1 | | Apple Computer MS 27AJ +-----------------------+----------------------------+ | 10500 N. DeAnza Blvd. | There's a million things we'd like to say, but we | | Cupertino CA 95014 | aren't supposed to piss anybody off. Oh well ... | +------------------------+----------------------------------------------------+ |{amdahl,decwrl,sun,voder,nsc,mtxinu,dual,unisoft}!apple!phil | +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) (12/04/88)
In article <362@lakart.UUCP> fgz@lakart.UUCP (Fred Genoese-Zerbi) writes: >I am working on a system that would need several (more than two) serial >ports, and would like to base it on the macintosh. I seem to remember >some time ago hearing about a company that was selling Mac II serial >port cards. Are these out on the market? Does anybody know the name >of the company that makes them, or other companies that make similar >cards? Are there any cards like that for the SE? What is the general >price of these cards if they do exist, and is it difficult to >drive the ports in software? SuperMac has a 4 port Serial card for the Mac II called 'CommCard'. It has drivers that have the same interface as the Mac's built in serial ports, you just open them with names other than ".Ain" etc. Everyone who has used one who already has application code for their serial ports has found the port to be close to trivial. The board has a processor built in to it and has 6k buffering on output, on input it has about 100 bytes, it knows about protocols like Xmodem/Kermit so it can be made to reduce its input interrupt rate way down. It has been shipping for A/UX for about 6 months (the A/UX version also acts as a serial board where it knows about the uucp G protocol, or as a LocalTalk board so you can print etc). The MacOS version (just software changes) is just coming out of Beta (no reported bugs for 2 months), people who want one now can however get hold of them (a number have already). If you want to obtain one contact Scott at SuperMac at (415)962-2491. WARNING: I designed the board so obviously I'm biased, however technical questions may be sent to me at ..!taniwha!paul Paul -- Paul Campbell ..!{unisoft|mtxinu}!taniwha!paul (415)420-8179 Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA "Read my lips .... no GNU taxes"
leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu (12/05/88)
phil@Apple.COM(Phile Ronzone) writes in comp.sys.mac >In article <362@lakart.UUCP> fgz@lakart.UUCP (Fred Genoese-Zerbi) writes: >>I am working on a system that would need several (more than two) serial >>ports, and would like to base it on the macintosh. I seem to remember >>some time ago hearing about a company that was selling Mac II serial >>port cards. Are these out on the market? Does anybody know the name >>of the company that makes them, or other companies that make similar ... > >SuperMac in Mt. View CA makes a 4 port serial card. I believe they >are selling it for around $500. Please note that Apple has NOT YET defined a way for communications software to access more than the two standard serial ports. If you are writing your won software to access the cards, then you will be O.K., but you will only work with that particular brand of card, and not others.. Just some info to keep in mind. +---------------------------------+-----------------------------------+ + + Any thing I say may be taken as + + Leonard Rosenthol + fact, then again you might decide+ + President, LazerWare, inc. + that it really isn't, so you + + + never know, do you?? + + leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu + + + GEnie: MACgician + MacNET: MACgician + + Delphi: MACgician + AppleLink: D0025 + + + + +---------------------------------+-----------------------------------+
paul@taniwha.UUCP (Paul Campbell) (12/06/88)
In article <46100241@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> leonardr@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu writes: > > Please note that Apple has NOT YET defined a way for communications software >to access more than the two standard serial ports. If you are writing your won >software to access the cards, then you will be O.K., but you will only work with >that particular brand of card, and not others.. > Just some info to keep in mind. This is very true, Apple have announced that they are working on something called the 'Communications Manager', what they've shown publically seems to be very good. However programs that use serial ports will require major rewrites. In the mean time there is a standard interface (the existing serial ports), our board (CommCard) uses this interface (but you open each port with a different name). Untill Apple's new code comes out for our board we have two possible solutions: - a software port remapper for the A/B ports, this is not much more than a software A/B box, but it lets existing programs work - the ability to search the system for serial ports (I posted this in comp.sys.mac.programmer a few months ago) so that you can throw their names up in a dialog box. However this requires programs to be modified. As far as I know this mechanism works with all the serial cards I know of. Of course many people who want to use serial ports want to do so from scratch for scientific or control applications (for example I have one user with 20 ports on his mac doing data collection), these people don't seem to need much more than the ability to open particular ports by name (so that they know which port is wired to which device). Paul -- Paul Campbell ..!{unisoft|mtxinu}!taniwha!paul (415)420-8179 Taniwha Systems Design, Oakland CA "Read my lips .... no GNU taxes"