Hi y'all, Does anyone here have any knowledge of the RS232/UART? Specifically I have a WiModem232 on my PC/XT (which has a 286 chip at 6MHz). I thought that the UART was a 16550A/AF but the more I think of it, it's probably an 8250A or maybe a 16450.
I haven't played with anything like the UART 8250, 16460 or 16550A in so long I forget now, what that was all about.
I wonder if you need a fossil with what you are doing? I remember back then, I'd lock the fossil at 38400 and that seemed to work most of the
golly thats a term i have not heard in a while nor needed to use... bless.. fossil drivers... yep recall them with a sense of satisfaction of having configured the sucker to work with the modem and the pc ;-)
Using BNU and its supporting documentation may well help perhaps?
Is there a reliable way of finding out exactly which UART one has in
MS-DOS? Next, if the system is an 8250A, what is the reliable baud rate of that controller? I am finding weirdness at even 9600. More reliable at 2400bps, but that's unusable for any real BBS'ing!
Just in case you are wondering what the complete picture here is, I'm trying to show how to connect to BBS's using real terminal software such as Telix or Terminate on real hardware. The WiModem232 is as close as you'll get to the real thing, but at rates of 2400bps, I don't think that'll look great on the BBS documentary!
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Wonderfully compact and complex bits of software. Talking about the UART made me think of that for some reason. I had another video fossil that made the colours come alive in my BinkleyTerm, a different thing
though.. from another time and place..
Using BNU and its supporting documentation may well help perhaps?
I always loaded x00 in my config.sys so it was always up and running for any software that wanted it, but they were both good workable solutions.
I don't have an answer to you original question, but there is at least
one other hardware alternative that works quite well: Lantronix adapters can be found on eBay. They let you go from serial as a Hayes compatible modem <> network/IP.
That's the other one I was trying to recall the name of :) Yes for me it was always BNU. I think I just got used to using it and it worked for what I needed to run at the time.
Good thoughts Nu. Hyjinx - there was a NZ based BBSer (David) who used one of these a few years ago.
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Hi y'all, Does anyone here have any knowledge of the RS232/UART?
Specifically I have a WiModem232 on my PC/XT (which has a 286 chip at 6MHz). I thought that the UART was a 16550A/AF but the more I think of
it, it's probably an 8250A or maybe a 16450.
hyjinx wrote to All <=-
Just in case you are wondering what the complete picture here is, I'm trying to show how to connect to BBS's using real terminal software
such as Telix or Terminate on real hardware. The WiModem232 is as close
as you'll get to the real thing, but at rates of 2400bps, I don't think that'll look great on the BBS documentary!
With some of the DOSBOX builds, you can emulate a serial port by passing through to a TCP port.
I barely remember FOSSIL Drivers. Can't really remember what they were for, but I know I had to use one on my 16550AF based serial controller on my 486. Just in case you can't remember what a UART is, it's just the chip on the actual serial controller. UART stands for Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter. I can't remember why exactly I needed the fossil driver, I just remember I had to load it to use Remote Access BBS software!
I note that the Wi-Modem 232 has DTS/CTS disabled by default. Do you think this is right?
I barely remember FOSSIL Drivers. Can't really remember what they were for, but
I know I had to use one on my 16550AF based serial controller on my 486. Just in case you can't remember what a UART is, it's just the chip on
the actual serial controller. UART stands for Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter.
I can't remember why exactly I needed the fossil driver, I just remember
I had to load it to use Remote Access BBS software!
I note that the Wi-Modem 232 has DTS/CTS disabled by default. Do you
think this is right?
I've written multiple 16550 drivers.
I used to have an XT/286 (5162) back in the UK but alas, I couldn't bring it with me to NZ so I sold it. Biggest mistake of my life! That machine is a unicorn and I'd love to have it again!Specifically I have a WiModem232 on my PC/XT (which has a 286 chip at 6MHz). I thought that the UART was a 16550A/AF but the more I think o it, it's probably an 8250A or maybe a 16450.
Is that the XT 286? Ordinarily the PC/XT came with an 8088
at 4.77MHz. The XT 286 was introduced as an offering between
the PC/XT and PC/AT (which also had an 80286 processor).
The XT came standard with an 8250 UART, while the AT had aThe Async card that came with my XT was replaced long ago. Unfortunately the current multi I/O card is only a 16450, so I'll go dig up a modern 16550AF and see if that wins any wars.
16450.
Neither will be particularly fast.
On 01-07-21 06:34, hyjinx wrote to Al <=-
Thanks for all your help thus far!
I barely remember FOSSIL Drivers. Can't really remember what they were for, but I know I had to use one on my 16550AF based serial controller
on my 486. Just in case you can't remember what a UART is, it's just
the chip on the actual serial controller. UART stands for Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter. I can't remember why exactly I
needed the fossil driver, I just remember I had to load it to use
Remote Access BBS software!
I note that the Wi-Modem 232 has DTS/CTS disabled by default. Do you
think this is right?
I've written multiple 16550 drivers.
Very impressive!
hyjinx wrote to tenser <=-
I used to have an XT/286 (5162) back in the UK but alas, I couldn't
bring it with me to NZ so I sold it. Biggest mistake of my life! That machine is a unicorn and I'd love to have it again!
My machine is a standard 5160 IBM XT. It has a daughter card made by Orchid (I think). It has an 80286 at 6-ish MHz, so the box performs similarly to a first-release 5170/AT, apart from the bus being 8-bit.
On 01-09-21 07:04, poindexter FORTRAN wrote to hyjinx <=-
Jealous. I started with an XT clone, but always loved the IBM AT case - for me, that was peak desktop design.
Vk3jed wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
I started with a home built XT clone myself. :)
Tenser knows his stuff :)
Tenser knows his stuff :)
Heh, rather I'm just forced to understand some of
the details cause of my job. :-)
I used to have an XT/286 (5162) back in the UK but alas, I couldn't bring it with me to NZ so I sold it. Biggest mistake of my life! That machine is a unicorn and I'd love to have it again!
My machine is a standard 5160 IBM XT. It has a daughter card made by Orchid (I think). It has an 80286 at 6-ish MHz, so the box performs similarly to a first-release 5170/AT, apart from the bus being 8-bit.
Jealous. I started with an XT clone, but always loved the IBM AT case - for me, that was peak desktop design.
On 01-10-21 09:13, poindexter FORTRAN wrote to Vk3jed <=-
Vk3jed wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
I started with a home built XT clone myself. :)
With a 10 meg hard drive. Hard to fathom. I remember backing it up to
360k floppies.
hyjinx wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
I'm going to make you more jealous now - I just got a 5170 AT! Haven't
had any time to play with it, but I ALSO just got the unicorn monitor
at the same time! The 5154 EGA!
Vk3jed wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
With a 10 meg hard drive. Hard to fathom. I remember backing it up to
360k floppies.
Yeah I had the 10 meg drive too. :)
had any time to play with it, but I ALSO just got the unicorn monitor at the same time! The 5154 EGA!
Amazing. How does the monitor look after all of these years?
On 01-13-21 07:37, poindexter FORTRAN wrote to Vk3jed <=-
Vk3jed wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-
With a 10 meg hard drive. Hard to fathom. I remember backing it up to
360k floppies.
Yeah I had the 10 meg drive too. :)
Not too much later I upgraded to a 30 meg RLL drive, boy was that spacious!
Not too much later I upgraded to a 30 meg RLL drive, boy was that
spacious!
I went from 10MB to 20MB MFM, 30MB RLL, then 70MB MFM, and after that, IDE of increasing sizes. :)
On 01-16-21 13:09, Bob Roberts wrote to Vk3jed <=-
RLL was the shit. My first HD was a 65 meg RLL, which I think was a 40 meg before compression (or whatever). I remember that RLL controller board was a full length beast. Everyone told me RLL sucked and that my data would get destroyed, but I never had any issue with it.
Vk3jed wrote to Bob Roberts <=-
A lot of people got burnt trying to use an MFM drive with RLL. While
it _could_ work (and did for many), there was a risk of losing data, because some MFM drives couldn't reliably handle the higher density of RLL. From memory, the drive technology was basically the same, it was
a matter of the exact specs of the drive. Using a certified RLL drive meant no hassles.
On 01-17-21 07:01, poindexter FORTRAN wrote to Vk3jed <=-
Vk3jed wrote to Bob Roberts <=-
A lot of people got burnt trying to use an MFM drive with RLL. While
it _could_ work (and did for many), there was a risk of losing data, because some MFM drives couldn't reliably handle the higher density of RLL. From memory, the drive technology was basically the same, it was
a matter of the exact specs of the drive. Using a certified RLL drive meant no hassles.
The same technology, but more sectors per track.
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