   [.net] Outputing pits from C# GameDev
  Some of you may have read my ongoing messages about trying to output bits from a C# game as one would do on a com port.  I finally found a solution.  First I pluged a usb to serial cable into my usb pc port.  That terminated in a db9 plug so I had to plug into a db9 to db25 cable; simple wiring conversion.  Finally I pluged the db25 cable into a RS232 to centronics converter plug from Aten technology.  That gave me 8 parallel bits that I can drive whatever I want with.  This is a way to develop custom hardware for your games.  Hope this helps somebody.   
  Er, except it won't. You can't use a DE9 to DB25 adapter to turn a serial port into a parallel port (you just turn a 9-pin serial port into a 25-pin one), and you can't control eight bits of the port directly (especially not with USB adapters, which can miss off signals that you normally can control).A PCI or ISA parallel port card will work fine if you don't have a port on your motherboard. USB parallel port printer adapters do not work as standard parallel ports, so are a no-go area.If you're building custom hardware, one easy option would be to could use a microcontroller to handle serial communications to and from your PC and use the USB-to-serial adapter.   ;  You could also use one of the many USB microcontrollers available and write a user-mode driver for it. It's actually not that hard (the hard part is making the hardware device, but that's the same no matter how you interface the hardware to the PC). I guess it depends on what kind of hardware you're planning to interface with.   ;  The db9 to db25 cable doesn't convert the serial to parallel.  It just makes a db9 rs232 into a db25 rs232.  The serial to Centronics parallel conversion takes place in the Aten cable converter plug.There probably are other strategies to solve the problem including plug in pc cards and I had investigated a number with no luck.  This one worked.  Oh, on my PC for some reason the com port tuirned out to be com4.   ;Quote:Original post by BrentlThe db9 to db25 cable doesn't convert the serial to parallel.  It just makes a db9 rs232 into a db25 rs232.  The serial to Centronics parallel conversion takes place in the Aten cable converter plug.Fair enough, it just seems like a bit of a Heath Robinson solution. [smile] Are you using the Centronics protocol in your project, then?Quote:Oh, on my PC for some reason the com port tuirned out to be com4.You can usually reassign COM port numbers via Device Manager.   