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From: Jim Dennis <jim@starshine.org>
Message-Id: <199607170028.RAA00935@starshine>
Subject: Re: 2.1.5R: UUCP errors, no flow control?
To: ben@stuyts.nl
Date: Tue, 16 Jul 1996 17:28:43 -0700 (PDT)
Cc: questions@FreeBSD.ORG
In-Reply-To: <9607162159.AA25913@daneel.stuyts.nl> from "Ben Stuyts" at Jul 16, 96 11:59:37 pm
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> 
> On Mon, 15 Jul 1996, Doug White wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, 16 Jul 1996, Ben Stuyts wrote:
> >
> > First of all, I am new to FreeBSD, but am very impressed with what I've seen
> > so far. I have a little problem though: I am setting up a system with 2.1.5R,
> > and I can't get UUCP to work properly.
> Well, I checked both today, even tried two other modems (another ZyXEL 1496E+  
> and a 2864), but still no good.
> 
> Finally I disabled the two rs232 ports in the motherboard's bios, and put in  
> an old isa-card with two 16450's and an LPT on it. Voila, it works... The  
> funny thing is, I still don't see any flow control, but the errors are gone.  
> Strange, huh? Could it be that the 16550 drivers are buggy? I guess I could  
> try building a kernel with the 16550 features disabled, or is there an easier  
> way to check this?
> 
> Now, I wanted those additional ports anyway, but I read somewhere that that's  
> not possible due to the pc's com port irq sharing, right?

> Ben

	It is possible to have have 4 "normal" (conventional) COM ports
	on a PC.  Yes, by default, these are arranged with an IRQ conflict.
	However that is a simple matter to fix (with most good I/O cards).

	For example in my 386 (from which I type this) I'm using a 
	QuickPath "Portfolio" multi-function I/O card.  In addition to
	two IDE channels, two PRN ports, and a floppy controller and a 
	game port, this has four high speed (16550AFN) serial ports with 
	individually configurable I/O port addresses and IRQ's.  

	I suggest IRQ 5 for COM3 and IRQ 9, 10, 11, or 12 for COM4.

	Naturally it's also possible to get specialized serial hardware
	(such as the Cyclades, RocketPort, Digi PC/8, etc).  I've 
	connected 128 serial ports on a single system (using intelligent
	DigiBoard hardware with TSX-32/TSX-BBS software).  

	I know that the Cyclades people agressively market to Unix
	(Linux and FreeBSD) users and provide plenty of support to
	people who write the drivers.

Jim Dennis,
Starshine Technical Services,