Experiences with 386i serial ports under DOS

[Glenn Roberts]

>  We have found that both the 386i serial port and ports on a multi-
>  port card (Comtrol h550) operate fine under Unix, in both directions,
>  upto 9600 baud... <but under DOS> ...When trying to transmit files
>  between two machines, 1200 baud is ok, but any higher causes DOS
>  window to evaporate

There's no question that the place you're most likely to get into trouble
on the DOS side of a 386i is any software that tries to do "real time"
interrupt handling.  This includes communication boards, speech boards,
A/D converters, etc.  Remember that the DOS interrupt handlers aren't
really talking to the hardware directly - they're going through Unix!
Sun's answer to this is likely to be "use the Unix side" (e.g. run Kermit
in a shelltool).  I understand that this isn't always the answer though.

- Glenn Roberts, The MITRE Corp., McLean VA (703) 883-6820
  gfr at cobra.mitre.org