Things You Need to Know
To Get the Most from Your Zapco DSP
Assigning a Com Port to the DPN
The Zapco DPN digital control program is designed to run on ports 1 through 10.
If you have had your computer for some time and you have had many devices plugged into it at various
times, it is possible that COM ports 1 through 10 have been used, or that for some other reason, the DSP
did not load to a Com between 1 and 10.
If this happens the program will not work. When you start the program the top row of LEDs on the
splash screen should stop at one of the ports numbered 1 to 10. If the LEDs do not stop and if they
move directly from the left side to the right side, you will need to assign a new port number to the
program and DSP.
This is a very simple operation:
Ÿ
Go to Control Panel
Ÿ
Choose Hardware and Sound
Ÿ
At the top right under Devices and Printers find and choose Device Manager
Ÿ
In the Device Manager list find Ports (COM&LPT)
Ÿ
In Ports find USB Serial Port (Com?) and see the Com Port number i.e. (COM13)
Ÿ
If the COM number is higher than 10 you will need to re-assign the COM Port
a. Open USB Serial Port (COM?)
b. Choose at the top “Port Settings”
c. Choose in the lower portion “Advanced”.
d. At the top of Advanced you will see the port assignment and a drop-down list.
e. Open the list and choose a port number below 10. (Do not worry if the list says the port is
already in use. You can ignore that **.) I usually use a port between 5 and 9.
f. Say OK and OK and close the device manager. You are now in a working port.
**
About ports:
When you plug a USB device into your computer, windows assigns a port. However,
when you remove the device, windows does not release the port. So if you have plugged 10 USB
devices into your computer since you have had it then you may have all of the first 10 ports marked "In
Use",
even if nothing is currently connected to the computer,
so the DSP will go to a higher port and you
have to re-assign the port.
Note to consumers:
After you assign a port, the DSP will always go back to that same port,
so you will
only have to do this one time.
Note to Zapco Dealers:
The computer Zapco uses for tuning has had many more than 10 DSPs
connected to it. So: We have to re-assign the port now for every DSP we connect to this computer. If
you tune many different customer's DSPs, you will need to assign ports more often also.
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