Brainboxes CC-629, Hardware Manual

Page 1: ... 2 1 EDITION January 1999 Photon 8 Port RS232 EVH EVI 1ERYEP ...

Page 2: ...ivalent unit COPYRIGHT COPYRIGHT 1985 1999 All rights reserved No part of this hardware circuitry or manual may be duplicated copied transmitted or reproduced in any way without the prior written consent of the Manufacturer Due to the Manufacturers commitment to quality software is subject to continuous improvements information regarding upgrades can be obtained from your supplier supplied to you ...

Page 3: ...es the features of the PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Card Chapter 2 Installing the card into the PC Explains how to open the PC and insert a new serial card Chapter 3 PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Software Installation This chapter details how to install and configure the Photon 8 Port RS232 Card in Windows 3 x Windows 95 98 and Windows NT Chapter 4 RS232 Port Cabling ...

Page 4: ...ns Installation for Windows 3 x 13 Serial Port Installation 14 Adding an PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Serial Card 15 Settings for Photon 8 Port RS232 Card COM1 Present 17 Settings for Photon Card COM1 2 Present 19 Settings for Photon Card COM1 to 4 Present 21 Configuring The COM Ports 23 Changing Serial Port Settings 23 Deleting Ports in Windows 24 Restarting Windows 24 Configuring Ports in Windows 95 ...

Page 5: ...ons for Windows NT 38 CHAPTER 4 RS232 PINOUTS AND PORT CABLING 39 Introduction 39 The RS232 Standard 39 Serial Port Pin Outs 40 9 Pin D Serial Port Connection To Another PC 41 9 Pin D Serial Port To A Modem 43 9 Pin D Serial Port Loop Back Connector 43 The Lynx Card Octopus Cable Pinouts 46 ...

Page 6: ... Port RS232 Card Features Eight independent RS232 Serial ports Reliable communications up to 50 feet 15m and beyond 100 16C550 PC Compatible serial port up to 230 400 baud 16550 Compatible FIFO provides 128 byte input and 128 byte output buffer on each port Full modem control TXD RXD DSR DCD DTR RTS CTS and RI signals Fully double buffered for reliable asynchronous operation High speed integrated ...

Page 7: ...nector Fully moulded 8 Port cable with EITHER 9 or 25 pin D connectors Also refer to Chapter 4 RS232 Pinouts and Port Cabling for more detailed information on RS232 cabling ports and pinouts Configuring PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Cards The PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 cards are fully plug and play and require no hardware configuration They can be installed directly from the box ...

Page 8: ... then check the software selectable communications parameters Baud rate Parity stop bits first and that the communications program is attempting to access the serial port installed If this fails to solve the problem check the cable connections Finally check that the card is indeed configured as you believed NOTE Always turn the computer OFF before installing or removing any interface board After h...

Page 9: ...reful to ensure that the gold plated PCB fingers fits neatly into the I O expansion connector Press down firmly but evenly on the top of the PC Serial card Figure 2 15 STEP 5 The D connector should fit neatly through the slot s aperture to the outside world NB Use the screw kept back from the blanking cover to screw the PC Serial retaining bracket into the PC back panel housing STEP 6 Now replace ...

Page 10: ...rial card is installed correctly ii Ensure that other cards in the PC have not been upset iii Ensure that the power is connected and the PC is switched ON n If all these have been checked and the PC still does not power up then there is probably a conflict of I O address between the PC Serial card and another board in the PC Ask your dealer to check this ...

Page 11: ...e PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Card into a free PCI slot and power up the PC 2 Determine the resources that the PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 has claimed 3 Inform Windows 3 x of those resources Determining PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Resources Insert the card into a PC as described in Chapter 2 power up the PC From DOS Run BBCARDS EXE Found on the supplied CDROM by typing the following HVMZI HMWOMQK WWYXMP TGM F...

Page 12: ...he interrupt line shared amongst the Photon 8 Port RS232 card s serial ports The Bank address FF40 The Bank address determines the COM Port Base addresses in the following manner COM Base of port 1 the Bank Address COM Base of port 2 the Bank Address 8hex COM Base of port 3 the Bank Address 10hex COM Base of port 4 the Bank Address 18hex COM Base of port 5 the Bank Address 20hex COM Base of port 6...

Page 13: ...nstalled components for deletion and selecting Add All chooses all uninstalled components for installation Several of the components have user selectable parameters e g target install directory which can be changed by clicking on the button These options may not be changed once the components have been installed A README TXT file on the disk contains details of the latest updates to this software ...

Page 14: ...ue button will start the installation process When the setup program has finished select the Done button A Windows restart message will be shown only if the Windows communications driver option has been selected and you should choose Yes to allow the new driver to run Serial Port Installation From Main select Control Panel ...

Page 15: ...e displayed Adding an PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Serial Card For each port on the Photon 8 Port RS232 card we need to ADD a port and fill in the following 7 settings in the order given Default values for the communications settings are given whenever the ADD button is used 9600 baud no parity 8 data bits and 1 stop bit ...

Page 16: ... k The SISR Base address must be set as indicated by the BBCARDS program lThe Card Port setting tells Windows whether this is the first second third fourth port etc of the Photon 8 Port RS232 card Standard Settings m The COM Base is determined from the Bank Address as described above P63 nThe IRQ must be set as indicated by the BBCARDS program o The UART on the photon port is an enhanced 16550 cal...

Page 17: ...FA0 FF40 11 COM2 FFA0 1 FF40 11 16950 Default COM3 FFA0 2 FF48 11 16950 Default COM4 FFA0 3 FF50 11 16950 Default COM5 FFA0 4 FF58 11 16950 Default COM6 FFA0 5 FF60 11 16950 Default COM7 FFA0 6 FF68 11 16950 Default COM8 FFA0 7 FF70 11 16950 Default COM9 FFA0 8 FF78 11 16950 Default The BBCARDS Values may be different from your machine Card Port 1 Card Port 2 Card Port 3 Card Port 4 ...

Page 18: ... Photon 8 Port RS232 Software Installation Chapter 3 Page 18 NOTE The only settings that change from port to port are the COM Base and the Card Port Settings Card Port 5 Card Port 6 Card Port 7 Card Port 8 ...

Page 19: ...C0 10 COM3 FF80 1 FFC0 10 16950 Default COM4 FF80 2 FFC8 10 16950 Default COM5 FF80 3 FFD0 10 16950 Default COM6 FF80 4 FFD8 10 16950 Default COM7 FF80 5 FFE0 10 16950 Default COM8 FF80 6 FFE8 10 16950 Default COM9 FF80 7 FFF0 10 16950 Default COM10 FF80 8 FFF8 10 16950 Default The BBCARDS Values may be different from your machine Card Port 1 Card Port 2 Card Port 3 Card Port 4 ...

Page 20: ... Photon 8 Port RS232 Software Installation Chapter 3 Page 20 NOTE The only settings that change from port to port are the COM Base and the Card Port Settings Card Port 5 Card Port 6 Card Port 7 Card Port 8 ...

Page 21: ...E0 FF80 5 COM5 FFE0 1 FF80 5 16950 Default COM6 FFE0 2 FF88 5 16950 Default COM7 FFE0 3 FF90 5 16950 Default COM8 FFE0 4 FF98 5 16950 Default COM9 FFE0 5 FFA0 5 16950 Default COM10 FFE0 6 FFA8 5 16950 Default COM11 FFE0 7 FFB0 5 16950 Default COM12 FFE0 8 FFB8 5 16950 Default The BBCARDS Values may be different from your machine Card Port 1 Card Port 2 Card Port 3 Card Port 4 ...

Page 22: ... Photon 8 Port RS232 Software Installation Chapter 3 Page 22 NOTE The only settings that change from port to port are the COM Base and the Card Port Settings Card Port 5 Card Port 6 Card Port 7 Card Port 8 ...

Page 23: ...gure 3 3 After Adding a PHOTON Card COM1 present Note Adding a port automatically sets default values for the communications settings to 9600 baud no parity 8 data bits and 1 stop bit These values can be changed as described below Configuring The COM Ports Figure 3 4 PCI Photon Card Comms Settings Changing Serial Port Settings Once the Photon 8 Port RS232 card has been installed it may be necessar...

Page 24: ... for the hardware settings window Figure 3 4 Enter the 7 options in the same manner as described in the section Adding a PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Serial Card Deleting Ports in Windows The Delete button can be used to discard the entries of ports that have been removed from the system Note Due to problems with the standard Windows Serial Ports Applet in the Control Panel Make sure that there are no ...

Page 25: ...ce is that only one PCI Photon Card should be added to the PC per restart E g if three PCI Photon cards are to be installed then the whole of the following procedure needs to be carried out three times Windows 95 98 Installation Procedures Insert the card in a free PCI slot power up the PC Windows 95 should then load normally During the booting process Windows 95 will detect the card and briefly d...

Page 26: ... 8 Port RS232 Software Installation Chapter 3 Page 26 Figure 3 5 Windows 95 Installation from CD If you are installing from a floppy disk click Next and the software will be found on the floppy disk and installed ...

Page 27: ...apters See below If there are no other serial port cards installed above COM 4 the PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 will appear as COM5 COM12 If there are already more than 5 COM ports installed the Multiport card ports will appear as the next highest available COM ports PCI Photon Cards do not appear with the COM1 to COM4 assignment since these ports are reserved for legacy PCI cards PCI Photon 8 Port RS2...

Page 28: ... be as named COM 4 or lower The COM port assignment may be changed simply by selecting a new COM port value from the pull down menu relevant to the port However COM port usage other than those for the selected card itself are not checked so it is advisable to first check which COM ports are in use port availability can be checked by viewing the Device Manager Click to access Ports 5 8 ...

Page 29: ...tings In Win 95 98 Double clicking upon an individual port entry in the Device Manager and selecting the Port Settings tab will display Settings available in this window are 1 Baud Rate 2 Data Bits 3 Parity 4 Stop Bits 5 Flow Control 6 Restore Defaults When clicked this will reset the selected port to the default values of Baud Rate 9600 Data Bits 8 Parity None Stop Bits 1 Flow Control Xon Xoff Ch...

Page 30: ... behaviour of the driver is to operate on a wysiwyg what you see is what you get basis meaning the Baud rate that an application selects will be the Baud rate of the data leaving the port Selecting Double changes the driver behaviour in the following ways For applications using the above dialogue e g HyperTerminal there will be no change For applications directly calling the Win32 API e g Dial Up ...

Page 31: ...ports FIFO buffer on or off It is strongly recommended that the FIFO for all ports is left enabled Extend FIFO When the FIFO is enabled the default FIFO size is 16 Bytes The extended FIFO size is 128 Bytes Receive Buffer These settings allow the selection of a receiver FIFO trigger setting Selecting a low value will allow the interrupt to be serviced quicker which is good for slow machines If you ...

Page 32: ...wer data bytes per interrupt and this is recommended if you are communicating to a slower machine Selecting a high value will send more data bytes per interrupt and will give more time for multi tasking operations The trigger options in the case of the Photon Card s 128 byte FIFO are 1 32 64 and 112 2 Restore Clicking on this port will restore the port setting of the Serial Solutions tab to the va...

Page 33: ...ter 2 and restart Place the supplied Serial Solutions CDROM in a suitable drive and from the Start Menu choose Run and enter the path Below If you are installing from floppy disk the path will be drive setup exe where drive is the path to the drive containing the installation disk Selecting the OK button begins the conventional InstallShield setup process there are no options for this installation...

Page 34: ...3 Page 34 Examining Card Configuration Go to Control Panel Start Menu Settings Control Panel and double click on Serial Solutions After adding a Photon 8 Port RS232 Card COM 1 present you will be presented with a Serial Solutions Port Configuration window ...

Page 35: ...s Clicking on Port Settings from the resulting dialogue opens up the following window Settings available in this window are 1 Baud Rate determines the baud rate at which the selected port operates providing it is not overridden by any serial comms applications in use PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 will operate correctly up to 230 400 baud at distances of up to 10 meters Note Many serial comms application...

Page 36: ...he Advanced button of Port Settings in selected the following dialogue is displayed Settings available in this window are 1 FIFO settings Use FIFO Buffers turns the selected ports FIFO buffer on or off It is strongly recommended that the FIFO for both ports is left enabled Receive Buffer These settings allow the selection of a receiver FIFO trigger setting Selecting a low value will lessen the lik...

Page 37: ...r data bytes per interrupt this is recommended if you are communicating to an older external serial device Setting a high value will give better overall system performance when the host PC has multiple applications running simultaneously Be warned many older devices or even modern PC s without PHOTON ports cannot deal with long bursts of data especially at high Baud rates 2 Defaults When clicked t...

Page 38: ...tall Serial Solutions for Windows NT From Control Panel open the Add Remove Programs applet then be certain to close the Control Panel Select from the list Serial Solutions for Windows NT Click the Add Remove button Windows NT will then uninstall the Serial Solutions applet without the need for restarting your machine ...

Page 39: ...ts of the Photon 8 Port RS232 cards The RS232 Standard The RS232 standard is ancient in computer industry terms Introduced in 1962 it is now widely established RS232 is a slow photon short distance single ended transmission system i e only one wire per signal Typical RS232 maximum cable length is 50 feet with a maximum data rate of 20K bits per second Figure 4 1 RS232 Point To Point Connection RS2...

Page 40: ...at will allow you to fasten the cable securely to the PC card In general you will need to make up a cross over cable to correctly interface the PC to the RS232 port of another computer or device Traditionally making up the cross over cable has been considered a black art However provided you have the pin outs 4 2 8 66 6 8 8 4 2 8 7 8 6 76 4 2 0 6 83 7 2 87 4 2 86 271 88 8 8 4 2 6 8 6 4 2 8 8 61 2 ...

Page 41: ...Receive lines together Line 3 TXD Port 2 goes to line 3 RXD of the other PC Line 2 RXD Port 2 goes to line 2 TXD of the other PC This allows each to receive the data transmitted by the other 3 Connect the Port 2 DTR line pin 4 to the other PC DCD pin 8 and CTS pin 5 lines Also connect up the other PC DTR line pin 20 to the Port 2 DCD pin 1 and CTS pin 8 lines This allows the receiving device to si...

Page 42: ...n 8 Port RS232 Index Chapter 4 Page 42 Figure 4 3 9 Pin D Serial Port To Other PC Cable AT SERIAL PORT Side Other PC SERIAL PORT Side 9 PIN D CONNECTOR 9 PIN D CONNECTOR 89 0 6 46 7 28 8 32 7 1 8 6 46 7 28 8 32 ...

Page 43: ...cable and a straight through cable connected as the 9 to 25 pin adapter given in Figure 4 5 9 Pin D Serial Port Loop Back Connector A loop back connector can be used to echo RS232 data transmitted by a serial port back into its own RS232 receiver In this way the function of the serial port can be tested For an AT style Serial Port use the a female 9 way connector wired as in Figure 4 4 89 0 6 46 7...

Page 44: ...PCI Photon 8 Port RS232 Index Chapter 4 Page 44 Figure 4 4 9 Pin D Serial Loop Back Connector 9 PIN D CONNECTOR 25 PIN D CONNECTOR 7 1 8 6 46 7 28 8 32 89 0 6 46 7 28 8 32 ...

Page 45: ...le 9 pin serial port look like the standard PC 25 pin serial port It is NOT a cross over cable 9 Pin AT SERIAL PORT 25 Pin PC SERIAL PORT 9 Pin Female D Connector 25 Pin Male D Connector 89 0 6 46 7 28 8 32 7 1 8 6 46 7 28 8 32 2 2 2 86 86 8 8 76 76 687 687 6 6 6 6 87 87 2 86 8 76 687 6 6 87 2 2 8 86 6 87 6 687 76 ...

Page 46: ...n Function 9 Pin 25 Pin 30 50 11 10 Transmitted Data TXD 3 2 55 17 37 56 Received Data RXD 2 3 51 31 12 14 Request To Send RTS 7 4 16 53 59 57 Clear To Send CTS 8 5 54 34 58 38 Data Set Ready DSR 6 6 68 69 70 71 Ground GND 5 7 35 33 39 18 Data Carrier Detect DCD 1 8 49 32 13 52 Data terminal Ready DTR 4 20 36 15 20 19 Ring Indicator RI 9 22 78 way D connector Pinouts Port 5 Port 6 Port 7 Port 8 Pi...

Page 47: ... of the 78 pin D connector on the AT Lynx 8 Port RS232 NOTE On the above diagram the symbol followed by a number is used to notify a port on the cable e g 4 means port 4 hence PIN47 DTR 4 is pin 47 of the 78way connector which corresponds to the DTR function on port 4 ...

Page 48: ... 95 28 connectors 9 40 cross over 40 43 45 CTS 6 41 DCD 6 41 DSR 6 41 DTR 6 41 FIFO 6 handshake 41 installation 8 Installing Ports In Microsoft Windows NT 4 0 33 Installing Ports In Windows 3 x 11 Installing Ports In Windows 95 98 25 loop back 39 43 Maximum Baud Rate 30 modem 6 PCI Quad RS232 Specifications 7 pin outs 39 40 port ports 6 8 25 33 39 40 41 43 45 receive 41 RI 6 RS232 6 8 39 40 43 Ind...

Page 49: ...Photon 8 Port RS232 Index RTS 6 41 RXD 6 41 serial port 6 8 25 33 39 41 43 45 SISR 12 speed 6 stop bits 8 TXD 6 41 Uninstalling Serial Solutions PCI for Windows NT 38 Windows 2 4 25 33 ...