Dennis,
Imagine how disappointed I must have been to find out rhat my new
notebook PC (that's what they call laptops these days) I purchased in
November (OK, it was built in October 2005), was "older".... I rushed
out to replace with one of those newer simpler models with just USB
ports, but the nice man in the store told me to wait until
January...They are not going to have USB ports anymore, Just
firewire... On secomd thought, since this one has USB, Firewire,
Serial, and a couple of other ports, to hell with simplicity, I'm ok
with versatility...
He will also STILL need a male dsub 9 connector to plug into one of
those hundreds of converters you referenced, as well as driver software
for proper operation if he has no serial port...
regards
markvictor