About Serial Interface Ports - Gateway 386/33 User Manual

Serial and Parallel Ports 10-3
Introduction
Your system includes an I/O card that provides serial
and parallel interface ports. In this chapter, we intro-
duce you to both types of ports, and describe the connec-
tion points and jumpers on the I/O card.
The I/O card also provides the interfaces for the floppy
and hard disks. The disk interfaces are discussed in
earlier chapters.
About serial interface ports
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DB9 connector.
A serial interface port (often referred to as an RS-232C or
asynchronous communications port) canconnect modems,
printers, mice, and other peripherals to your computer
system. Serial ports are also used to transfer data to
other computer systems. For example, if you have a
notebook computer, you can transfer data back and
forth between the notebook and your Gateway 2000
system, using each computer's serial port.
The serial interface ports in your system are accessed
from the rear panel. The connector for the first Com port
isontheI/Ocard's mounting bracket. The connector for
the second port is located in a cutout in the rear panel;
it connects to the I/O card with a ribbon cable.
The serial interface port on your Gateway 2000 system
(and most other computers) is a 9-pin DB9 connector.
Older computer systems (and many peripherals) have
25-pin DB25 connectors. Don't worry if you need to
connect to a peripheral equipped with a 25-pin connec-
tor. Even though the connectors have differentnumbers
of pins, they can be connected with the proper cable.
Pinouts for DB9 and DB25 serial ports are shown in
Table 10-1.