jandarsun8

Got a question for anyone to answer. This is for my work but it's a project.

I've got 30 sales reps who need to monitor some of our equipment. Their roles are changing because of the economy so they are now stuck doing this.

The machines they need to monitor have an output that, for lack of a better description, looks like a cable plug that you plug into your TV. The other end of that goes from the device into a box about 6''x6'' that the wires get split up and plugged into four serial ports. The box then converts the signals into one USB port on the back of it, that gets plugged into their laptops. Making any sense so far cuz it gets more complicated. Basically what I'm working with is a four port serial connection to USB port.

When I plug the USB into the laptop I get the "Found New Hardware" wizard that ask for drivers and then proceeds to install drivers for all four serial ports. The problem with this is that it does this for every new USB port they plug this into. Their laptops have 6 USB ports on them so there is the potential to have to install this six different times.

The sales reps don't want do this so I'm stuck trying to figure out a way that I can put the drivers in the win/sys32/drivers folder or somewhere else that they will automatically install them selves with out being asked where the drivers are and with out having to manually do this on 6 USB ports for 30+ laptops.

If I install a HP printer through the USB port and unplug it and then plug it into one of the other ports, it doesn't continue to prompt for the drivers so I'm wondering why this device is and how to fix it. The manufacture of the device don't seem to think that's a problem when i brought this up to them and have pretty much written it off however they are the only place that build this particular device for what I need it to do.

Wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what to try or if I didn't explain this well enough, let me know and I'll try to do a better job. I don't think I can post any pictures of it up, however if you go here 4-Port Serial USB Industrial 4-Port DB-9 RS232 to USB Adapter with Isolation and Surge Protection $179.98 you'll get an idea of what I'm talking about. The only difference is that the four ports are actually inside the box with a different connector going to the machines.

Jand... I love my job, I love my job, I love my job (although I'm still working so that's a plus)

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Mac Daddy

That's interesting Jand and your almost going to have to write an installshield routine that points to the driver location.

Beyond me will google around for ya on the weekend if you still haven't found an answer

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

WxMan1

So each machine has one co-axial cable connector and up to four machines can be conected to one "black box" simultanesously. The output of the "black box" is one USB port.

People come up to the "black box" with laptops and try to interface to any and all of the machines connected to the "black box" via USB port on their laptops.

That's when things get a bit, say, "hairy".

I'm with you so far?



Of course I'm confused (you're talkin' 'bout co-axial connectors, DB-9 & USB ports). While certainly that makes sense to anybody else, I only gots 140 IQ (so bear with me).

WxMan1

This is mildly confusing.

EVERY time the laptop plugs a USB cable into the "black box" the "new hardware" message prompts the driver installation wizard?



The only time that should happen is if hardware is proprietory (even then its highly annoying). Otherwise, if the OS knows what that crap is, it should just install the drivers without any prompting whatsoever (other than notifying the user that something wierd happened).

I fixed that issue on my box by copying the Windows installation CD to HDD. Then I altered specific registry entries so that any time "new" hardware components are encountered by the OS, it goes off and gets whatever crap it needs all by itself (without user intervention) - user is notified that "new hardware encountered" message is balloned down in the system tray area though - as if it was getting it fro the CD. Furthermore, the foregoing is the status quo despite continual updates to the installed OS from the OS manufacturer that feebly attempt to address ongoing security issues with the OS.

I can't even remember the last time I've had to actually insert the physical Windows installation disk into the CD-ROM drive.

WxMan1

Been there, done that and I fully sympathize with you concerning sales reps as the user types. If your job description includes system security, I also empathize with you.

I've seen first hand what sales reps are capable of.

Moreover I've explicitely had to deal with their promises because at the "moment" they didn't want to deal with things. AFAIC, its as if N. Korea fired a missle and nobody cares (but its your job to deal with the fallout, eh? )

Right. That won't happen again.

Anyways, one way of doing it is to send an intern out to the remote sites and "load" the laptops with all the drivers any arbitrary sales rep may need. Of course speculative intern will need said each sales reps laptop to be performed on-site.

OR, an intern could take one lap-top to each and every site and get the required driver implemenation configured to that lap-top, and then YOU image that laptop's HDD to each and every sales rep.

There is NO downside to that idea whatsoever that I can see.

So it looks like this trouble ticket is closed out then?

jandarsun8

No, it's kind of messed up. There is only one Co-axial plug in however there are about 12 cords coming from the plug in that split up inside the black box that connect to four serial connectors. The serial connectors are soldiered to a board that convert it to a USB port. The USB port coming out off the back of it basically looks like a printer USB cord (big square plug on the back of the box to regular plug in for the laptop). I have no idea who designed this but this is how they have it done. Wish I could take a picture of it so it's better understood because i know I'm not explaining this quite right. Why they don't go straight from the co-axial cable to a USB plug is a complete mystery.

If I plug into one USB and install it, unplug it and plug into the exact same USB port on the laptop, it works just fine however it's when I plug it into any other port that it pops up with the New Hardware wizard.

Wanted to stay away from having to re-image all 30 of them as the sales reps are located through out the US and they'd have to send it in for that. We've got 200 total, just these 30 are the ones doing the monitoring as well so sending out an intern won't work.

I've got about two weeks to figure this out or some other way of getting this thing installed but it's time that always seems to fly by.

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jandarsun8

This is what I was kind of hoping to do, put the drivers in the Windows directory so that it would install automatically. There might be a balloon that pops up but I can deal with that. It's any intervention from the Sales reps that I'm trying to eliminate (not to mention their bitching about it).

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jandarsun8

Hmmm if I was a programmer this wouldn't be a prob. My specialty is networking and hardware, next to nothing for software.

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Mac Daddy

I don't play with programming as much as I used to that's for sure but will look around for ideas for ya. See not only are you going to need an install routine pointed towards the driver location but you are also going to have to have a function call from Windows if you want it automated. That's the tricky bit. ...

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

Judas

label one of the USB ports as "BLACK BOX ONLY" and make the lazy ones do it...

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jandarsun8

LOL if only they'd listen though. There will also be one or five sales reps going "I have this box that popped up on my screen that I don't know what to do with." and then after explaining that they need to plug it into the one labeled "BLACK BOX ONLY!" they'd say "Oh, that's what that meant!"

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jandarsun8

I do need to ask who designed this though. It's our equipment so I don't know if it's our engineers who designed this and sent it to a third party for manufacturing or if it was the third party the designed and manufactured it but I'm wondering why they didn't go from coax to straight USB on it unless it had something to do with having to develop drivers of some type to communicate with the device itself that they would have to program. That part, I don't quite understand how things communicate with Windows or what actually needs to be done. Windows needs to know what it's communicating with so that is my only reason for why the developed it this way. It would have been nice to have more information than just handing the thing to me and saying "Here, fix it."

This serial work around that they have is a pain in my ass right now though.

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Mac Daddy

On the coaxial to USB conversion there is more going on in that interface than a simple wiring configuration. But like you said would nice if they gave you more info before dropping hot coals on your nads

On the drivers there has to be some batch file or something to be done .. I will check around for ya just done work for the week .. THANK GOD

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen