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From: gil@limbic.ssdl.com (Gil Kloepfer Jr.)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.modems
Subject: Re: AT I/O card with 16550, available
Summary: Oops...
Message-ID: <1991Apr14.215409.16152@limbic.ssdl.com>
Date: 14 Apr 91 21:54:09 GMT
References: <1991Apr9.145116.5205@jwt.UUCP> <0ZB0Z2w163w@aegis.or.jp>
Organization: Southwest Systems Development Labs, Houston, TX
Lines: 46

>john@jwt.UUCP (John Temples) writes: [in someone else's article]
>>>Amen.  Stay away from the Western Digital version also...they don't
>>>work properly either.
>>
>> Can you back this claim up with some facts?
>
>And could you include the number of the Western Digitial version....

Sorry I didn't see your article, I've been away from the newsgroup
for a while.

I used FAS (I believe, at the time, it was 2.06) with NS16550s using
Steve Nuchia's 4-port card on a 386/25 running Interactive UNIX.  The
board worked flawlessly with the National parts.  When swapped out
with WD16550s, I noticed failed connections.  On an attached terminal,
it appeared that parts of text from previous lines were re-appearing
in text of later lines.  It appeared to be a problem with the way
the FIFOs were handled, but being that we left them in long enough
to find they didn't work, nothing else could be concluded.  Replacing
the National parts caused the board to work fine again.

At the time we (Judy Scheltema) and I did the experiment, I believe
we also tried it on a regular serial card we socketed and swapped-in
the WD16550s.  This board failed also.

Here's the full chip-front from the WD 16550s that we used:

		(C)WDC'88
		WD16C550-PL
		00-02 8913
		002367846592

I'd be very happy to entertain comments as to what would make this
chip work, as I have a few of them in my possession that were used to
make this evaluation.  I've been saving them in case someone came up
with the reason why they didn't work.  However, the common consensus
is that they DON'T work, and so I'm inclined (having experienced the
same results) to stay clear of them.

Hope this is enough of an explanation for y'all.

Gil.
-- 
Gil Kloepfer, Jr.              gil@limbic.ssdl.com   ...!ames!limbic!gil 
Southwest Systems Development Labs (Div of ICUS)   Houston, Texas
  "No one is listening until you make a mistake"  - Murphy