[comp.unix.microport] 16550A's for $10

brian@apt.UUCP (Brian Litzinger) (11/21/88)

I have access to inexpensive 16550A's.

These are 16550A's, NOT bug ridden 16550's.

If you would like some, send a check to the address listed below.

The price is $10 each including shipping via US mail.

The offer is only made to locations within the continental
United Stated.

California residents add appropriate sales tax.

!!!!!   Please don't call regarding this deal.  !!!!

The warranty is 30 days or your money back.  You must return
the product to get your refund.

The reason I'm selling these parts is because ANTHEM Electronics
refused to give me a quantity discount on 32 parts.  They wanted
$20 each.  So, I bought 1000 from one of their competators, and I'd
like to save as many people as possible from buying them for $20
each, plus my company uses them, so everyone is happy, except
possibly ANTHEM 8-).

I convinced the company to allow me to do this on the basis of the
goodwill it would generate for our company in the Unix community.

If you have any questions PLEASE use email! DO NOT CALL!

The address is:

    APT Technology, Inc.
    16550A OFFER
    5539 Prospect Ave, Suite 119
    San Jose, CA  95129

<>  Brian Litzinger @ APT Technology, Inc.  San Jose, CA
<>  UUCP:  {decwrl,sun,pyramid}!daver!apt!brian    brian@apt.UUCP

bill@twwells.uucp (T. William Wells) (11/23/88)

I have a question. How might I discover whether I'd benefit from
having one of those chips? I have a vanilla Zenith 386. I looked on
the I/O card; the only chip that I thought might be a serial chip has
the part number NS16450N.

Please respond via e-mail.

---
Bill
{uunet|novavax}!proxftl!twwells!bill

steve@nuchat.UUCP (Steve Nuchia) (11/24/88)

From article <202@twwells.uucp>, by bill@twwells.uucp (T. William Wells):
> I have a question. How might I discover whether I'd benefit from
> having one of those chips? I have a vanilla Zenith 386. I looked on
> the I/O card; the only chip that I thought might be a serial chip has
> the part number NS16450N.

Yup, thats the predecessor.  From the 550's data sheet:

	The NS16550A is an improved version of
	the NS16450 Universal Asynchronous babble...

To *benefit* from it you have to enable the fifo's, which takes
either driver hacking or dropping the right stuff into I/O space
and hoping your software can deal with it.  What I hear is that
the software out there doesn't barf if you go around it and enable
the fifo's, but you get better performance with a driver that
knows about it.

PS: If any of the half dozen folks I've sent pre-release copies
	of my driver to read this, let me know how its going.
-- 
Steve Nuchia	    | [...] but the machine would probably be allowed no mercy.
uunet!nuchat!steve  | In other words then, if a machine is expected to be
(713) 334 6720	    | infallible, it cannot be intelligent.  - Alan Turing, 1947