gnu@hoptoad.UUCP (06/15/87)
I am looking for a "smart cable" which will attach any RS232
device to any other (modulo very wierd stuff) without wiring
or jumpering. I'm tired of spending half an hour soldering on
cables every time I hook up a terminal or modem.
I have located a $50 "Smart Cable" which does 95% of this; it has a
plastic box with a few LEDs and two switches. Unfortunately,
while it has both male and female connectors on one end, the
other end must be ordered one way or the other.
I could always buy these and permanently attach a sex changer to
them (configured so it could be removed from the circuit without
getting lost) but I hate to support stupidity. While the Smart
Cable folks had a good idea, the missing connector sex is just too
dumb for me to want to give them money.
Anybody found a place that does it right?
--
Copyright 1987 John Gilmore; you may redistribute only if your recipients may.
(This is an effort to bend Stargate to work with Usenet, not against it.)
{sun,ptsfa,lll-crg,ihnp4,ucbvax}!hoptoad!gnu gnu@ingres.berkeley.edudave@lsuc.UUCP (06/17/87)
In article <2297@hoptoad.uucp> gnu@hoptoad.UUCP writes: >I am looking for a "smart cable" which will attach any RS232 >device to any other (modulo very wierd stuff) without wiring >or jumpering. I'm tired of spending half an hour soldering on >cables every time I hook up a terminal or modem. Of course, you really mean DB25's only, right? Otherwise you need a cable with 15-pin, 9-pin, 5-pin and all kinds of other ends, any of which can be used. Now *that* would give you some flexibility :-) >I have located a $50 "Smart Cable" which does 95% of this; it has a >plastic box with a few LEDs and two switches. Unfortunately, >while it has both male and female connectors on one end, the >other end must be ordered one way or the other... >Anybody found a place that does it right? They do exist. We had a salesman a couple of years ago demo'ing a printer, and he had one with both sexes at each end. He said they call them "orgy cables". David Sherman Toronto -- { seismo!mnetor cbosgd!utgpu watmath decvax!utcsri ihnp4!utzoo } !lsuc!dave
peter@sugar.UUCP (Peter DaSilva) (06/24/87)
Take 4 female and 2 male DB25s, and a bunch of 25-conductor ribbon cable. Add a bunch of molex pins. Connect them like so: === ribbon cable --- single cable 2 copies of: DB25P===DB25S===================DB25S "connectors" "plugboard" 25 copies of: pin-----pin add to taste: pin-----pin-----pin pin-----pin-----pin-----pin etc... Now, take the 2 single female DB25s and bind them together with electrical tape or something (kinky). Stick the pins in them (oh!) 1-1, 2-2, 3-3, etc... and you have a standard gender-bender cable. Stick 1-1, 2-3, 3-2, 4-5, 5-4, 6-8-20, and so on... and you have a standard reversing cable. You can tape a tackle-box to the "plugboard" to hold all the cables. This will do anything you ever need to do with DB25s, and probably a bunch of stuff you don't. And you probably have all the parts lying around already.