Reply to: Notebook required

Re: ComPort consolidator via USB2

Ive just bought this beauty for £900, and i can say its an absolute bargain:-

www.tchibo.co.uk/is-bin/I...KU=0001970

Spec

The family entertainer
Forget the flicks. Forget the stereo system and DVD player. Forget your old PC. This laptop takes you into a new dimension of entertainment! Write and rewrite DVD´s or CD-ROM´s, turn your living room into a home cinema, surf the net with Wireless LAN - in any room and at any time! Are you ready for this new dimension?

Software (OEM versions):


Mobile AMD Athlon™ XP-M processor 2600+
512 MB DDR RAM
60 GB hard drive
Multi Standard DVD /CD Burner (DVD-RW/-R/+RW/+R & DVD-ROM & CD-RW / -R)
15.4" TFT Widescreen Display (15:10)
ATI™ Mobility® Radeon® graphics with up to 128 MB shared memory
Internal 56K V.90 modem
10/100 MBit/s. Fast Ethernet network card
Software (OEM versions):

Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition, pre-installed
Microsoft® Works 7.0 & Entertainment Pack, containing:
Microsoft® Encarta
Microsoft® Picture IT Photo
Microsoft® Flight Simulator 2004
Cyberlink Home Cinema
Ahead Nero Burning ROM 6
Pinnacle InstantCopy
Power Director
Music Match
Power DVD
Internet access software:

AOL
Accessories:

Laptop bag
Li-ion battery
"Ice Age" DVD
Weight: approx. 2.9 kg

ComPort consolidator via USB2

I know extra devices, are a pain to drag around, but we just implemented a 8 Serial device solution for a POS system.

We used 2 Comtrol RocketPort USB II devices without much hassle. They are nice and small too, about the size of a spare battery.

Contact Tony Elveridge @ Control Europe

Contact Information-
Comtrol Europe Limited
Unit 2
Avonbury Business Park
Howes Lane
Bicester
Oxfordshire
OX26 2UA
Great Britain

Tel +44 (0) 1869 323220
Fax +44 (0) 1869 323211


Tell him I sent you, and he will charge you double! No seriously they are good devices, and each unit can present upto 4 Com ports via USB. The host machine sees them as separate Com ports.

Let me know what price he offers them at, I may be able to get a discount. We just bought hundreds!

Cheers

JM

Notebook required

How does it sounds? Only one serial but it has 3 USB ports, you can connect a usb to give you a serial connector.

Intel Pentium Mobile 4 3.0GHz Processor
512 DDR RAM Memory
60Gb Ultra DMA-100 Hard Drive
15 SXGA TFT Screen (1400 x 1050 x 16m)
64Mb ATI Radeon Mobility 9000 Graphics
Built-In Video Camera
DVD/CDRW Combo Drive
Internal Floppy Disk Drive
Firewire, 3x USB 2.0 Ports
56k Modem, 10/100Mbps LAN
Microsoft Windows XP Pro
Ability Office 2002
Antivirus Software

Model: Iridium starbook 865
Price: £1,430.00 including vat
much cheaper than this website www.atv-computers.co.uk/s...cts_id=118

One year Warranty, let me know.

Giannis

Re: And the answer is

I've had no problem with mine, talked to loads of things with it. Not tried programming against it using anything clever, so that may be the problem.

And the answer is

Dell 8600 with parallel and serial port. Pentium M 1.7, 1 x 512mb, I'll get another 512 for 95 quid. 15.4 1920 x 1200 screen.

A 2 port PCMCIA card can be got for 90 quid I might try a USB/Serial hub since if it doesn't work propertly it is no great loss.

Thanks for all your help.

usb/serial

Vetran - I know several people who have tried these and had problems.

I think that the mini-docking station is the best bet.

ASB

how easy is it for you to create a mini app that tests the serial port for your needs ? Would you need to have your hardware physically present ? No chance of just putting some software on a cd and taking it round the shops ?

Re: Real antique.

USB / Serial adapter £20 (Maplin), multiport pcmcia card ~ £200 Grey matter.

Re: Real antique.

Don't think they are quite that rare, AtW.

Re: Real antique.

details information on all ports should be on sites of company-manufacturer.

all fails I can sell you my old laptop with rare COM ports for bargain £5k

Real antique.

Yes, the app I do quite a lot of work on was spawned from one I produced in Aus in 95 - on a completely different HW platform (completely bespoke). That in turn had been spawned from one I wrote in the UK in '87 - on a different completely bespoke HW platform.

If the port to .net is working well then maybe I'll be able to string it out for another 15 years.

Simon.

Re: trying to find out

I was reading a thread on Tek-Tips the other day from someone who was trying to run an ap in a "dos" box on XP and communicate with a USB serial port because his laptop didn't have a serial port.

The ap was an antique (like most of mine) and he got as far as having it sort of recognize that a port was there but that was it.

Funny how essential some of these "legacy" items can be....

trying to find out

That is one of the issues. Trying to get an accurate answer. Whoever I try (high street and dell so far) I have the following conversation:-

Me: "And so that serial port on the card is exactly the same as a serial port on the mainboard"
Salesman: "Yes"

M: "So to labour the point all my software which uses it will continue to function without problems"
S: "Yes"

M: "So I will make it a condition of the sale"
D "Oh no we can't do that"

M: "So you'll lend me one for a couple of days first"
D: "No"

The problem is that they wan't me to shell out a considerable sum on the say so of some herbert who can say no more than "it will probably work, but if it doesn't tough". Still 'twas ever thus I suppose.


Simon

Re: Ports

COMs should still be there, though I'd be careful to check

Ports

Mark,

Yep, I know it's difficult.....

The reasons for the ports are:-

1) The parallel port. Some of the development I do is Micro Focus Cobol, an old version 3.4. This requires a dongle on the parallel port. The rainbow driver is not available beyond NT but there is a hack available that gets it running on XP.

The actual code produced is 16 bit OS/2 which runs in NT-OS/2. Obviously XP won't run this code but having recently done some experimentation I think I can achieve my goals with a host NT partition and MS Virtual PC.

Since I travel with it the parallel port must be on the notebook.

2) The serial port. Quite a lot of the development I do involves certain specialised peripherals, ultimately the requirement is to be able to access "COMn".

In an ideal world I would have about 5 com ports (the card I use in my desktop provides an additional 8) . So if a mini docking station (or PCMCIA card) provides ports that are acessible as COMn it should work fine.

Cheers.

Simon.

laptop

Simon,

I think you will find it difficult to get that sort of spec.

What do you need the serial and parallel ports for ? Those 'legacy' items are getting rare. Are you doing device driver stuff ?

Would a mini docking station be acceptable ? or a pcmcia card with two serial ports ?

Mark