"Larry" wrote in message
...
wrote in news:1148499942.560560.301020
@u72g2000cwu.googlegroups.com:

But what do you do when all you have is a RS232 port?


Er, ah, buy a computer made in the last 8 years?....

RS232 IS DEAD....really!

Not really. Only in the consumer market. 99% of the industrial computers
have serial ports because 99% of the industrial devices that need to
communicate have a serial port.

Meindert

wrote:

Look at it this way, if you have a USB port you can easily add a RS232
adapter. But what do you do when all you have is a RS232 port?


I assume were talking about laptops, you can easily add anything needed
to any PCI bus PC. On laptops most of the non-USB models will have
PCMCIA so you can add a PCMCIA dual port USB port adapter.

I think the laptops that did not have PCMCIA are all dead or in museums
by now. But I'm also sure that there is someone out there still using
them. Probably trying to get linux running on them. :)

Jack

--
Jack Erbes in Ellsworth, Maine, USA - jackerbes at adelphia dot net
(also receiving email at jacker at midmaine.com)

On Thu, 25 May 2006 08:13:31 -0400, Jack Erbes
wrote:


I think the laptops that did not have PCMCIA are all dead or in museums
by now. But I'm also sure that there is someone out there still using
them. Probably trying to get linux running on them. :)

I got this story from a Dell laptop owner that I don't know very well,
so I can't vouch for it. He said that his new Dell has, in place of
PCMCIA, something called Dell Express. It sounds and looks a whole
lot like PCMCIA with an arbitrary form factor change to make it
proprietary. He had purchased a PCMCIA cellular modem and data plan
from T-Mobile and discovered the card didn't fit. When he called
Dell, they said that it was up to the cell company to support the
obviously superior Dell proprietary format. When he called T-Mobile,
they said they'd never heard of Dell Express and weren't interested in
it either.

I remember Dell pulling this stuff back in the day with proprietary
video card slots, so it doesn't sound entirely unlikely. Caveat
Emptor.

__________________________________________________ __________
Glen "Wiley" Wilson usenet1 SPAMNIX at world wide wiley dot com
To reply, lose the capitals and do the obvious.

Take a look at cpRepeater, my NMEA data integrator, repeater, and
logger at http://www.worldwidewiley.com/

"Glen \"Wiley\" Wilson" wrote in
:

When he called
Dell, they said that it was up to the cell company to support the
obviously superior Dell proprietary format.

Exactly at the point in time when he should have packaged it back up and
returned it to its source for a full refund.....(c;

Gateways have a PCMCIA slot......and 4 USB ports...(c;