prolific serial drivers and bad cables

VEX V5 General Discussion Technical Discussion
1

There have been more cases of old VEX programming cables apparently failing to work. The cause of many of these failures are updated prolific drivers detecting that the cables use an unauthorized version of the PL2303 serial to USB chip. About a year ago I posted information indicating which drivers have been shown to work, I’m reposting that information here and also some additional results with recent versions of ROBOTC and Windows 7. Tests were done using Windows 7 Pro 64 bit.

The original results are posted here but I’m copying into this thread as well. The works/no works indication refers to the “pirate” PL2303 based cable. All drivers work with “good” cables.

**Windows XP SP3

**
PROS 2b06
Version 7/26/2012 2.1.35.211 (this was V1.7 from prolific)
No Work

ROBOTC 4.03 Beta
Version 10/7/2011 2.1.27.185
No Work

ROBOTC 3.51
Version 10/7/2011 2.1.27.185
No Work

ROBOTC 3.08
Version 10/7/2011 2.1.27.185
No Work

ROBOTC 3.04
No driver included, the driver on ROBOTC.net is the same as the VEX wiki
Version 6/23/2005 2.0.2.0
Works

EasyC 4.1.0.5
Version 4/17/2006 2.0.2.5
Works

GPS_AllInOne_1013 (This is the same one that EasyC includes)
Version 4/17/2006 2.0.2.5
Works

Prolific 1.3.0 (also called v1210, MarkO’s from below)
Version 11/19/2009 2.0.13.130
No Work

XP Driver from VEX wiki
Version 6/23/2005 2.0.2.0
Works (but lots of errors in usb trace)

Latest on Prolific web site 1.7.0
Version 7/26/2012 2.1.35.211
No work

**Windows 7 Pro 64 bit

**
PROS 2b08
Version 7/26/2012 3.4.36.247 (this was V1.7 from prolific)
No Work

ROBOTC 4.03 Beta
Version 10/7/2011 3.4.25.218
No Work

V1.9 from the prolific web site
Version 10/17/2013 3.4.62.293
No Work

Vista driver that VEX recommends for Windows 8, from VEX wiki
Version 7/31/2007 3.2.0.0
Works

Prolific 1.3.0
Version 3/12/2010 3.3.11.152
No Work

GPS_AllInOne_1013
Version 10/27/2008 3.3.2.105
Works

EasyC V4.1.0.5
Version 10/27/2008 3.3.2.105
Works

So pretty much the same result, any driver after Oct 2008 detects the bad cables and refuses to load.

Another solution that allows recent drivers is to just replace the USB to serial part of the programming kit but keeping the serial to RJ11 interface. prolific recommends this part as using an authorized chipset.

http://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Adapter-Prolific-PL2303HX-Chipset/dp/B00425S1H8?SubscriptionId=AKIAJ27KPV45VTL2XA5Q&tag=plugabltechno-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B00425S1H8

One additional benefit of using this adapter is that it is officially supported under Windows 8 as it contains the rev D version of the PL2303 chipset.

2

This is the cable we switched to until we ordered a bunch of new cables.

The only down side is that you have two sets of female screwheads so one has to be ripped off to make it connect.

3

Or add an RS232 extension, something like this
http://www.amazon.com/SF-Cable-Serial-Extension-RS232/dp/B006W3XVL4/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1384275315&sr=8-6&keywords=rs232+cable

I replaced some of my bad cables with adapters made by Ativa (sold by office depot) with good success, they don’t need modification and connect properly. The problem is that many of the cheap USB-serial adapters can end up with the unauthorized copy of the prolific chipset, you never know until you try them. There are other chipset vendors, most notably FDTI and silabs, these work well but are not recognized as programming adapters by the programming software by default. ROBOTC can use non prolific serial ports, not sure about EasyC or PROS, there’s no technical reason why not just that they are trying to make everything streamlined and so search specifically for prolific adapters.

There are also some more expensive adapters that are much more likely to have genuine prolific chipsets, unfortunately once the adapter starts to cost $30 or more you may as well spring the $50 for the new VEX programming cable.

4

I’m bumping this thread for the benefit of @gzook who asked a question about the prolific drivers in the EasyC technical Q&A. There are other issues related to Windows 8 discussed elsewhere on the forum. Also see the VEX wiki firmware page here
Software_Downloads

This is the best place to find cable drivers.

5

Old thread, but wanted to add a little more information to it today.

ROBOTC Still ships with prolific driver version 3.2.0.0, this is the same one that VEX recommends for Windows 8 and is available from the VEX firmware download web page.

Windows 10 likes to update software automatically, if it updates the prolific driver to the latest version even “official authorized” cables may now fail to work.

If this happens follow the instructions VEX gave for rolling back the driver.

Versions that I have tested and work under Windows 10 are
3.2.0.0
3.4.25.218

Version that does not work for me.
3.6.81.357

This information only relates to the OLD programming kit that was discontinued in 2012.

6

This is actually really helpful. I was running into issues this past weekend trying to use the old cables with Windows 10.

Will take a look this week.

7