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Recommend USB to Serial Adapter for Cisco Products

Hello,

Looking for a reliable USB to Serial port adapter. We just purchased IBM ThinkPad T42's with no serial ports. I purchased a USB to serial port adapter from Sewell to test. My test results connecting to the following Cisco products... Cisco 3745 Router Cisco 3550 Switch Cisco 4503 Switch

have had limited success. If I connect to one of the above Cisco products then disconnect from the console port I usually have problems connecting to one of the other above Cisco products, sometimes the problem is re-connecting to the same product. Sometimes pulling the USB adapter out of the port fixes it, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes a reboot or 2 reboots fixes the problem. I downloaded an updated a driver from Sewell and I never was able to connect to the above Cisco products. I removed the new driver and went back to the older driver and at least got back to the intermittent connection problem. I tried a new console cable, same problem. The laptops are running Windows XP Pro with SP2, we use Hyper Terminal to connect. I put a breakout box on the cable and can see DTR and RTS go high when Hyper Terminal is running.

Anyone have experience with USB to Cisco connections?

Thank you,

John Marra

Reply to
John Marra
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In comp.dcom.sys.cisco John Marra :

Doesn't surprise me.

My condolences.

Not with cisco, but with a halfway recent USB chipset Edgeport USB serial connector do a pretty good job, at least with

*Linux*.

Good luck

Reply to
Michael Heiming

Thats why we bought a small docking station for our Thinkpad X40. ThinkPad plus docking station together form still a reasonably small and compact unit to carry along.

Regards, Christoph Gartmann

Reply to
Christoph Gartmann

There is some material in the group on this. Google. e.g. [usb bae] [usb vincent]

Hansang Bae reported: "Some don't.

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search for GUC232A Works just fine. "

Vincent C Jones reported: "But good ones do exist. I've been living with one for two years now (IBM X23 running Linux, generic dongle based

on the FTDI chip)."

Reply to
anybody43

I highly recommend the Keyspan USB to Serial Adapter for your console connections. I 've been using mine for about 2 years on my Cisco Routers.

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--- rh ---

Reply to
RH

I second this recommendation. Works fine.

Reply to
Rob

Ouch... sort of defeats the purpose of buying an X40. For the price, you could buy three or four different USB to serial adapters and have a high probability of getting at least one with useful Windows drivers. Also make sure you get one which supports generating a break so you can do password recovery.

One hint: Look for dongles which advertise Linux support! Even though you are using Windows, you'll have a much higher probability of getting working drivers if your dongle is based on a well known chip which is widely supported (which is implicit in having Linux support). As I have stated previously, I've been using a generic dongle based on the FTDI chip for years, every since I moved to the ThinkPad X series several generations ago (currently an X31, the last of the X's taking a standard 2.5" hard drive).

Be forewarned that what works for one person may or may not work for you! Vendors have been known to change the chip they use while not changing their product labeling or even version number. Each chip uses different drivers. As always, YMMV.

Good luck and have good hunting!

Reply to
Vincent C Jones

I third it. Works with Mac OS X as well as with Windows.

Reply to
Aaron Leonard

For those of you that are in the UK, you could also try

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search by code usb005, it comes with a parallel connection too.

Reply to
Alphaomega

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