[Elecraft]RS-232 and USB with Elecraft.

[Lee Buller]

I like what Julian said here and I think he is spot on.  I do not think it would take much for the wizards at Elecraft to redesign the KIO3 to include both...RS232 and a USB port.  users could swap out one for the other and you have USB port.  That is so cool about the K3 and its modular design.  Again, the whole issues of drivers come up, but I am sure Elecraft would keep up with it all.  But that is another expense to redesign the unit and keep up with all the programming of the USB drivers.  

RS-232 is not going away anytime soon, but you are hard pressed to find these ports on new systems...laptops in specific.  As long as the USB to Serial cables are available, I think Serial devices will be around for quite awhile.  The technology is proven...although old ... but very proven.

Lee - K0WA


In our day and age it seems that Common Sense is in short supply.  If you don't have any Common Sense - get some Common Sense and use it.  If you can't find any Common Sense, ask for help from somebody who has some Common Sense.  Is Common Sense divine?

--- On Mon, 8/25/08, Julian, G4ILO <julian.g4ilo at gmail.com> wrote:
From: Julian, G4ILO <julian.g4ilo at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] K3 competition from Icom?
To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Date: Monday, August 25, 2008, 11:02 AM



R. Kevin Stover wrote:
> 
> I've always considered a Serial to
> USB adapter as a " box of chocolates", you never know what
you're going
> to get. Whether it works or not depends entirely on the chip set used
> and the quality of the driver.
> 
> Elecraft should have used USB ports.
> 
I don't agree. By using a standard RS-232 port Elecraft has provided
greater
flexibility. If they had provided a USB port then everyone is stuck with it.
A serial port can be interfaced to USB using a readily available and
inexpensive adapter, or, as has been pointed out, by installing a PCI serial
card in an expansion slot. A USB device can only be interfaced to a PC that
has a USB port and drivers for that particular device.

Of course, Icom will ensure that the drivers are available today to connect
the thing to Windows. But drivers may not be available for other platforms
(as was the case with the RigExpert interface I sold because I could not use
it under Linux) and they may not be available at all in 25 years time by any
OS which is not an unreasonable time for someone to still be using a radio
(even if not the original owner.) Whereas you can be pretty damn sure that
RS-232 ports will still be around, and there will be adapters to interface
them to whatever type of peripheral connector is popular at that time.

I have grown resigned to the idea of throwing away perfectly serviceable
computer peripherals only a few years old because drivers are no longer
available but that is not something I want to do with a $4000 radio.

-----
Julian, G4ILO. K2 #392  K3 #222.
http://www.g4ilo.com/ G4ILO's Shack   http://www.ham-directory.com/ Ham
Directory    http://www.g4ilo.com/kcomm.html KComm for Elecraft K2 and K3 
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