[Elecraft] USB to serial angst

[Joe Subich, W4TV]

That is completely uninformed and demonstrates a dangerous lack 
of knowledge about the way USB operates. 

Placing a USB port in the K3 would simply move the USB UART 
currently found in the USB to serial converter onto the KIO3 
board.  If Elecraft were to use the prolific chipset currently 
in the KUSB, they would also be stuck with the Prolific drivers  
that are notoriously problematic with VB 6 software and would 
render the K3 unusable with several popular software packages. 

USB *** HAS NO ADVANTAGE *** over standard RS-232 ports and it 
*** NEVER WILL ***.  Going to USB requires a substantial added 
investment by the manufacturer and a major ongoing support 
cost.  

In addition to the software support cost, USB is a multiplexed 
(shared) system level bus.  Because of the system architecture 
data rates on the bus are much higher than the serial equivalent 
through put.  That makes USB much more susceptible to both 
radiated and conducted noise problems.  Computer motherboards 
(and laptop/netbooks) that fail to properly ground the USB 
shield to the board's ground plane are almost guaranteed to 
become wideband noise generators (something that is very rare 
with the 8250 compatible UART). 

73, 

   ... Joe, W4TV 
    

> -----Original Message-----
> From: elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net 
> [mailto:elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of eric manning
> Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2010 2:08 PM
> To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
> Subject: Re: [Elecraft] USB to serial angst
> 
> 
> All in favour of a USB port on the K3?
> 
> Then we could forget about un-necessary, expensive , flaky  and 
> crash-prone USB to serial adapters.
> THe serial port  with its RS-232 interface is obsolete. It 
> dates back to 
> the 70's if not earlier and was superseded  by USB.
> 
> eric
> 
> VA7DZ
> 
> S/N 3640
> 
> -- 
> This message has been scanned for viruses and
> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> believed to be clean.
> 
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:Elecraft at mailman.qth.net
> 
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html