[NTLK] Connection woes!

[Don Zahniser]

Hi, Jason - 

On 11/21/09, Boyer Jason wrote:

>I'm frustrated.

It's happened to us all, I'm sure.
>
>Thanks to the help of several members, I got my shiny new serial
>interconnect, an 8 pin serial cable, a Keyspan 28X usb to serial dongle,
>and a 20 MB flash card, all tools to connect my new MP2100.  Couple that
>with two computer options, a Lombard PB with 9.2.2 and a Macbook Pro
>with 10.6.
>
>Attempt 1: Lombard PB with Keyspan to serial connection and Newton
>Connection Utilities.  Installed the Keyspan drivers from their website
>and plugged in the dongle.  

Someone with direct experience will have to chime in here.  However -
since the Lombard is closely related to the Pismo, I would suggest
making sure that you use the upper USB port.  On my Pismo, the upper
port seems to have better power characteristics.

Also - what kind of 8-pin cable did you get?  There's a 'straight
through' cable and a 'printer' cable.  Not sure which is the correct one
in this case, but suspect it would be the 'printer' cable.

>
>Attempt 2: Plugged the flash drive into the Lombard in hopes of manually
>transferring some packages.  OS 9 sees it as a PCMCIA device in Finder
>and refuses to let me see the contents or put any files on it.  Finder
>claims that it isn't a storage device.  Doh!  Seems to work fine on the
>Newton, however.

The Newton has its own data format; the short answer is that you can't
exchange data between the Newton and a PC or Mac by moving the card
between computers.

>
>Attempt 3: Macbook Pro with Newton Connection 1.2 software and cable
>setup.  Keyspan OS X drivers appeared to install much more successfully
>here, although the dongle appears as three different modem ports in
>Network Connections.  I gave each a configuration named "Newton", but
>wasn't sure what else to specify as normal modem designations didn't
>seem to apply.  Again, following the connection instructions in Newton
>Connection manual, and trying to connect via Newton Dock using all sorts
>of combinations, I can't get anybody to talk.

I'm not sure that the configuration in Network Connections is an issue. 
Do you get three different serial ports appearing in NCX Preferences?

 - Don