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6 Other Operating Systems
Device drivers for Windows NT and OS/2 are also available for the
DSCLP-100. The board can be used under DOS and other operating systems as
well in many circumstances. The software described below can be downloaded
from the Quatech web site if it did not come with the board.
6.1 Windows NT
The Windows NT device driver is installed by running the SETUP
program. Up to 256 serial ports are supported. There is a command line-based
configuration utility which is used for adding PCI bus and ISA bus serial ports.
Please refer to the documentation included with the device driver for full
installation and configuration details.
6.2 OS/2
The OS/2 device driver supports up to 32 serial ports in a system.
Installation is a manual, but simple, process. Please refer to the documentation
included with the device driver for full installation and configuration details.
6.3 DOS and other operating systems
The DSCLP-100 is not a direct drop-in replacement for a legacy serial port
because its base address and IRQ cannot be fixed at values such as 3F8 hex, IRQ
4 (COM1) or 2F8 hex, IRQ 3 (COM2), etc. Rather, the system BIOS assigns the
address and the IRQ in a plug-and-play fashion at boot time. Software which is to
use the DSCLP-100 must be able to accommodate any valid assignments of these
resources.
For Windows 95/98/2000/ME, Windows NT and OS/2, the Quatech
device drivers determine what the resource assignments are and proceed
accordingly. In other cases, however, the user must intervene. The discussion
below will center on DOS, but the concepts can be applied to other operating
systems as well.
Many DOS applications support user configuration of the base address and
IRQ of a serial port. Such applications can generally make use of the
DSCLP-100. Older applications, as well as some custom software, may use
hard-coded standard legacy serial port addresses. These applications will require
modifications if they are to use the DSCLP-100.
Custom applications for which the customer has source code can be
modified to make just a few PCI BIOS function calls to obtain all the necessary
configuration information. The PCI BIOS specification can be obtained from the
PCI Special Interest Group. Contact Quatech technical support for more
information.
29 DSCLP/SSCLP-100 User's Manual