[Dxbase] re: dxbase 2005 and vista

Tue Oct 28 13:30:31 EST 2008

All,
I have been using an old Toshiba Tecra 8100 for years in my shack, 
running WinXP Pro and DXBase 2005. As I stated before, the only thing I 
do is read the frequency and mode from my Kenwood TS-870 into DXB. The 
Tecra has both real serial and parallel ports.
In the interest of modernization I recently bought a Lenovo T400, which 
does not have any ports other than USB. I specifically bought this 
computer because I could "downgrade" it to WINXP. I acquired an 
Qualtech USB to Serial adapter and it works fine, once I tinkered with 
the speed settings on the port, DXB and the Kenwood. 
Tomorrow, according to UPS, my new Elecraft K3 arrives and I hope this 
will be equally uneventful.
Now the bad news. In the interest of experimentation, I just hooked the 
USB-Serial adapter to my DELL XPS-410 super-duper Quad core desktop 
running Vista Home Premium SP-1 and loaded the appropriate drivers. I 
connected the radio and after setting up this copy of DXB as soon as I 
clicked on "connect radio" the computer did a full blown crash.
I rebooted and did a little tinkering with the firewall, allowing an 
exception for DXB, even though I'm not sure this is either necessary or 
wise. When trying again to connect the radio and getting a second 
crash, I decided that I had wasted enough time on this exercise and 
report it only FYI.
Regards,
Wes
FireBrick wrote:
> yes I don't know what we will do when there are NOT COMPORT COMPUTERS.
>> But I did use one of the older (like 5 years ago) Belkin USB to serial 
> adapters.
> It even did 5 bit code for fsk/rtty.
>> Should have kept it as then I'd remember the model number...
> But you may find one on eBay.
>> Think the model number began with a FU something something.
>> sorry I can't be of more help.
> I'll ask on the rtty reflector, someone will remember....I'm old and 
> can't remember ....much of anything.