[time-nuts] Bad TBolt Crashing LH?

Dan Kemppainen dan at irtelemetrics.com
Wed Aug 30 13:03:41 EDT 2017


Hi,

Not to flood the list with traffic, but as this is probably an issue 
that many list members run into I'll speak up. FTDI has been very good. 
We've run everything from their very first chips through USB 3 hardware, 
and never had any problems.

The TTL-232R series of cables are also very handy, USB on one end with 
3.3V or 5.0V serial on the other. No dongles...

FYI, Mouser and Digikey are also sources:

https://www.digikey.com/products/en/cable-assemblies/smart-cables/468?k=FTDI

http://www.mouser.com/Wire-Cable/Cable-Assemblies/_/N-bkre6?Keyword=FTDI&FS=True

-Dan




On 8/30/2017 12:00 PM, time-nuts-request at febo.com wrote:
> Message: 2
> Date: Wed, 30 Aug 2017 14:26:24 +0100
> From: Dave B <g8kbvdave at googlemail.com>
> To: time-nuts at febo.com
> Subject: [time-nuts] [OT] Re:  Bad TBolt Crashing LH?
> Message-ID: <20ce5538-ad60-779f-7a61-a048008bd1b8 at googlemail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
>
> Yep, Prolific got badly hit by the counterfeiters.   So, they
> depreciated the use of all the early generation chip-sets (even legit
> ones!) and had MS push out updated drivers to enforce that.   That's why
> it "appears" to be a Windows update problem that stops many older
> Prolific based adapters working...
>
> The indication of that, is a non working adapter, that shows a Yellow
> triangle with an exclamation mark, when you look in the Device Manager
> to see what's recognised.
>
> Sadly... FTDI too have been hit by the bad guys out East.   They too,
> had MS push out an update a while back that could detect the fakes and
> brick them!   Well, you can imagine the bad press that created!
> Thankfully, it is possible to un-brick the things 100% successfully,
> with a little Googling and a Linux tool.  (Rewriting the VID/PID data.)
>
> In truth, what seems to have happened is that the counterfeiters are
> using a micro-controller programmed to emulate the real things, and are
> getting quite good at it.   But..  In the case of the FTDI clones, what
> should be configurable options (polarity of the serial lines & auxilary
> IO line functions etc) are fixed, though the FTDI configuration program
> thinks the chip is good, the requested changes don't take effect, no
> errors, just no changes.
>
> I have also recently purchased "Genuine FTDI" based adapters, only to
> find that one proudly installed itself with a Prolific driver!   The
> other used the FTDI driver, and both worked, "as standard".   But, as I
> *Needed* the user configurable options, I returned them to the seller
> for a full refund.   Seems he got scammed with 1000's of them!   I
> popped the lid on the one that loaded a Prolific driver, only to find
> the chip marked up as FTDI!
>
> It has to be noted, that it appears that even the very old Prolific
> chips, and all fakes that I've encountered so far, just seem to be
> accepted and work as standard, just fine under Linux, but for how long?
>
> The only way to guarantee a genuine FTDI adapter, is to buy it from
> FTDI   http://www.ftdichip.com/   They have a webshop, and the prices
> are not that bad.
>
> I use what does appear to be a genuine Prolific based device to talk to
> my T'Bolt.   I used to use that with Windows 7, but I now use Linux Mint
> (after the great Win10 fiasco) on the same PC.  Not a painless change by
> any means, but I've not regretted it.
>
> Regards.
>
> Dave B.
> G8KBV
>


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