System Administrator Screens

5.As the transceiver initializes itself on power-up, watch the LED lights on the side of the transceiver. You should see the lights flicker briefly with a burst of activity. You may see occasional flickering of the lights after this initial burst.

6.After the brief burst of LED activity, open the trans- ceiver setup screen in the PC software and check the “Last Power-up Settings”. If they show the Net- work ID = H and Transceiver ID = H settings as described above, the serial connection between the PC and the transceiver is functioning properly.

7.Close the transceiver setup screen.

8.Power down the transceiver and restore the dip switch settings to their Network ID = A, Transceiver ID = A settings.

9.Power up the transceiver.

10.After the initialization activity reflected by the lights on the transceiver, open the transceiver setup screen and confirm that the “Last Power-up Set- tings” read Network ID = A and Transceiver ID = A.

If the “Last Power-up Settings” do not update, one or more things may be happening.

First, the serial port selected on the transceiver setup screen may not be the one the serial cable is plugged into. Many newer computers have only one serial port on the back of the computer; the port may or may not be COM1. It could easily be another COM number, so if other COM ports show up in the transceiver setup screen’s drop down list for Serial Port selection, try using each of those in turn and repeat the above steps. Many new computers have no serial ports at all, in which case a USB to RS232 converter is required to supply at least one serial port. Graco recommends the purchase of Edgeport brand USB to RS232 converters, available from www.bb-elec.com. Follow the installation instruc- tions for the converter carefully and make sure you reboot the computer when complete. Again, don’t assume the COM port number—the documentation with the converter should help explain what COM port num- ber the converter will provide.

When the Matrix PC software starts up, one of the first things it does is check with Windows to find out what serial ports (COM ports) exist in the system. These ports are the ones listed in the Serial Port drop down list on the transceiver setup screen. If a port you expect is not listed there, it is because it is not registered as a valid port with Windows.

Second, the selected COM port may be in use by another program on the PC. In this case, even if the Serial Port selection on the transceiver setup screen matches the port the cable is plugged into, no Matrix communication will happen because a different software program “owns” the port. The only way to get it to work is to either shut down the other program or configure either the other program or Matrix to use a different COM port. Software programs that use serial ports include fax software and PDA software.

Third, the cable between the PC and the transceiver could be either bad or wired improperly. The latter is most likely to occur when an RS422 connection is used; the former could happen with either serial cable choice. Make sure the cables are firmly connected, so that there isn’t a chance the plug or wire is falling out on either end.

Repeat this setup for each Transceiver ensuring that no two Transceivers use the same Network and Transceiver IDs. If you have only one transceiver, Graco recom- mends using the default Network ID and Transceiver ID settings.

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