[amsat-bb] Re: Working ISS and or other digis

[Gordon JC Pearce]

On Sun, 2011-06-19 at 09:38 -0400, Donald Pittman wrote:
> I know there are many out there that work the ISS and cube sats . The
> question is do any of you use Apple Mac's to do so. If you do what are you
> using ? I have been trying quite unsuccessfully to get a KPC3 that I got
> back in 97 to talk to the Mac mini using a TRENDnet TU-S9 usb to serial

I know that all the Kantronics TNCs I've tried have been flaky as hell
on USB-to-serial converters, probably because they don't provide the
full voltage swing that the TNC looks for.  I did consider building a
converter with a proper level shifter, but an easier solution was to
give the KAM to someone with a PC with a real serial port and just stick
to using a Tiny-2 when mobile ;-)

In summary, Kantronics KPC-3 == works, kind of; Kantronics KAM == no
input, output OK (never gets past the autobaud screen); various
Tiny-2-alikes == perfectly okay with USB-to-serial or real serial ports.

Gordon MM0YEQ