Instrument Control (GPIB, Serial, VISA, IVI)

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Access to remote RS232 Port via USB

I am running LabWindows/CVI version 7 on Windows 2000. I have a USB to RS232 converter installed to a USB port on the Win2K computer. This device also has a driver installed that the vendor (Prolific) calles a Virtual COM Port Driver. The driver makes the USB serial port appear in Windows device list as COM6:. I am able to access this COMM port in the normal manner using various software whenever that software accesses the COMM port via the Windows API or a special DLL such as MSCOMM. I have had the port working well in Visual Basic (via the MSCOMM) and in HyperTerminal.

Now my question, being totally new to LabWindows CVI, I want to know the proper way to interface to this COMM port. Do I simply install calls to the entry points
in the RS-232 Library using COM6 as the port ID?

I guess I also want to know if the RS232 Library functions all interface to the hardware through the Windows API? Or do the library functions have direct hardware access to the old original ISA PC based COMM port hardware at the likes of ports 0x3F8, 0x2F8, 0x3E8...etc??

Thanks
Mike Karas
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Q: Do I simply install calls to the entry points in the RS-232 Library using COM6 as the port ID?
A: Yes

Q: I guess I also want to know if the RS232 Library functions all interface to the hardware through the Windows API?
A: Yes

Keep in mind that the objective of any Virtual COM Port Driver is to mimic a native com port. If you ever run into the situation where the native com port works, but your converter's com port doesn't, you should contact the manufacturer. This of course refers to calls to the Windows serial API, direct writes to memory are not included in this statement.
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