Serial Mouse? 1

[T3chGuy]

Hey Guys,

Ok so I have XP Pro. I have a GPS module hooked up to it that Windows keeps detecting as a serial mouse. I have tried adding the /NoSerialMouse and /NoSerialMice line to the boot.ini file and it didn't seem to do anything. I have also tried making the change in Microsoft article

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;283063

The registry change didn't seem to change anything either. Does anyone know how to disable the detection of serial devices? Or perhaps how to edit the list of PNP devices so that I can remove the serial mouse from that list?

Thanks =-D

 

[mobajwa]

Dont you have the correct drivers for the GPS. If you install those, it wont think the gps is a mouse anymore !

-
mobajwa

 

[linney]

Does this help?

Overview of the COMDisable Tool

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;819036

 

[bcastner]

Simply disable the "mouse" in your device manager when it first happens. Do not uninstall, disable.

 

[T3chGuy]

The disable COM doesn't help.

I can disable the device the first time (not uninstall)but that only fixes the problem of not being able to use the pointer. Once windows recognizes there is data coming it it says hey there is a serial mouse loads it then disables it. Because it has already determined that it is a mouse it will not identify the USB to serial adaptor as a COM port. And so I have no COM port and I can't get data from the GPS module.

On a side note the GPS module is a standalone that just spits out serial data. There are no drivers for it is just takes the data in through a serial port on a PC. (the USB to serial converter that I can't get to work right) =-(

Any other ideas? Maybe someone knows of a USB to Serial adaptor that works better?

 

[jimp56]

who made this device, what manufacturer and model? surely they would have some support faq on their site that addresses this problem?

 

[garebo]

I can tell you that i have had problems with usb to serial adaptors as well, with an older palm pilot i once had. Tried 2 different adaptors and gave up.
At the time i read a lot of posts on different forums and lots of people were having probs and no solutions. Some of these hardware adaptors just dont work, i believe, not sure if yours is one of them.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[T3chGuy]

The adaptor is a Targus PA088 and they don't even acknowledge ever making the product.

The GPS is a Trimble SV8+ and is a stand alone box that spits out serial data.

If USB to serial adaptor is not a possibility then does anyone know of a better solution, being that serial ports have become non-existant on laptops?

A good PCMCIA to serial card?

Alternative methods of getting serial data into a laptop?

 

[jimp56]

i would suggest looking for a pcmcia serial port card.

only other alternative i can think of would be to create a small fat partition on the hard drive, boot off of a dos-based cdrom, run the gps monitor program from the dos environment, and capture the data to the fat partition, which could then be read from windows later if necessary.

 

[bcastner]

Once windows recognizes there is data coming it it says hey there is a serial mouse loads it then disables it. Because it has already determined that it is a mouse it will not identify the USB to serial adaptor as a COM port."

I hope you realize this is squarly an issue with the USB to serial cable.

One thought: linney gave a link to the command line tool. Use the fact that Scheduled Tasks permits, among other things, a schedule at Startup and a schedule at Logon.

Try:

. use the command line tool and schedule a task to disable the com1 port at startup;

. use the command line tool and schedule a task to enable the com1 port at logon

 

[gx3]

I noticed you asked for drivers. I have a NavRoute external usb gps module. I have found that usb/serial drivers from just about anywhere work on my XP. If you go to NavRoute, Earthmate, or Google PL2303 usb/serial you will find the drivers. You can even download the Earthmate gps gui which works better than the one that came with NavRoute.

 

[IQ0]

the noserialmice is not a valid XP boot.ini switch, try this:

/fastdetect:comnumber
This switch turns off serial and bus mouse detection in the Ntdetect.com file for the specified port. Use this switch if you have a component other than a mouse that is attached to a serial port during the startup process. For example, type /fastdetect:comnumber, where number is the number of the serial port. Ports may be separated with commas to turn off more than one port. If you use /fastdetect, and you do not specify a communications port, serial mouse detection is turned off on all communications ports.

Note In earlier versions of Windows, including Windows NT 4.0, this switch was named /noserialmice.

 

[bcastner]

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;833721

And a star for IQ0