Quatech QSP-200/300 user manual Windows 95/98/ME/2000/NT Installation

2 Windows 95/98/ME/2000/NT Installation

Windows 95/98 maintains a registry of all known hardware installed within the computer. Inside this hardware registry Windows 95/98 keeps track of all the computer's resources, such as base I/O addresses, IRQ levels, and DMA channels. In the case of a PC Card (PCMCIA) type board, Windows 95/98 configures the new hardware using free resources it finds within the hardware registry, and updates the registry automatically.

Windows 95/98 handles the QSP-200/300 as a "parent/child device". The QSP-200/300 is the "parent device". Each serial port is a "child device" of this "parent device". To allow easy configuration of Quatech's QSP-200/300, two configuration files have been written. These files are called "INF" files. The "QSP-200.INF"file describes the resources of the QSP-200/300 parent device and indicates the number of child devices. There are 4 child COM ports for the QSP-200/300. The "MLTPT_SP.INF" file describes the settings for each serial port including all the necessary device drivers.

Windows 95/98 allows changes in the system resources if the default choices are unacceptable. But first, allow Windows 95/98 to configure all of the devices. Since the child COM ports are dependent on the parent devices resource allocations, the resources can only be modified at the parent device. Changing these resources is an easy task described in a later section.

QSP-200/300 User's Manual 2