On 6/25/21 2:48 AM, Peter Corlett via cctalk wrote:
USB-serial dongles tend to be a wretched experience for a couple of reasons. The first is at the electrical layer: USB only has 5V available and generating RICH CHUNKY VOLTS in such a small dongle is difficult and expensive, so doesn't happen, and the voltage swing might not be wide enough for older devices.
That sounds like a legitimate problem. But it sounds more like an /execution/ problem than a /possibility/ or /capability/ problem. E.g. USB interface between a host the device (both in the USB parlance) where the device is externally powered.
The other is in the software layer: the standards are a mess and the full gamut of serial protocols are not available and/or not implemented properly.
I can't tell if that's a USB specification problem or a problem with what people have executed / built (thus far).
From my naive point of view, I wonder if it would be possible to build some sort of USB device that has a traditional UART that has supporting circuitry to connect to the host over USB. -- I say this because it sounds like many ~> most ~> all (?) USB to RS-232 converters are doing something inferior.
The physical connector and pinout is an irrelevance in comparison. I own a soldering iron.
LOL (literally) I love your sentiment there. I quite agree with it. -- Grant. . . . unix || die
