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A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: Robert Hancock on Sep 25, '03 08:57:10PM

I have an Elecom UC-SGT USB-serial adpater with the Prolific PL2303 chip (I can see it through the clear casing) that refuses to work with the Prolific drivers (both 1.0.6 and 1.0.7b4) under both 10.2.6 and 10.2.8.
When I plug the adpater cable in and open System Profiler, I get the following profile:
Manufacturer ID: 1390
Product ID: 20483 ($5003)
Device speed: Maximum
Current: 100 mA
but when try to create a new serial port in the Network Port Setting of the Network preference, nothing happens. There is no USB-serial device.
I have read the net about various hacks like the one posted here and tried them all to no effect.
Any ideas what I am doing wrong?



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A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: Robert Hancock on Sep 25, '03 11:54:18PM

As a follow up, when I run Verbose mode at boot, I see a string of messages saying:
IOUSB interface specific family matching fails
This streams down the boot log about 20 times and then the boot proceeds. Could this mean that the ProlificUsbserial.kext driver is loading but somehow failing to recognise the Elecom USB-serial adapter with its PL-2303 chip?
If so, what should I do to hack the Pinfo.list file in the kext driver?
If I know the product ID and manufacturer ID, from the System Profiler, could I plug them into the driver?



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A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: LC on Sep 26, '03 12:13:46PM

I have a couple of PL-2303 based USB cables and at one point
early on, I seemed to have fewer problems when I connected
one of them through a USB hub, then into the system. That is
probably irrelevant though, in most cases.

Also, at one point I tried running "USB Prober", which is a nice
little helper, I think I actually needed the DDK for that. They talk
about getting debug info from the IOUSBFamily kext, in this doc --
http://developer.apple.com/hardware/usb/usbloggers.htm

but that's probably not helpful for your situation ... thought I'd
mention it since, you never know; Larry.



[ Reply to This | # ]
A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: iDG on Sep 27, '03 07:14:20AM
You could try this:
Open /System/Library/Extensions/ProlificUsbSerial.kext/Contents/Info.plist with a text editor, find the line

        <key>IOKitPersonalities</key>
        <dict>
After the <dict> tag, add:

               <key>5003_056E</key>
                <dict>
                        <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key>
                        <string>com.prolific.driver.PL2303</string>
                        <key>IOClass</key>
                        <string>com_prolific_driver_PL2303</string>
                        <key>IOProviderClass</key>
                        <string>IOUSBInterface</string>
                        <key>bConfigurationValue</key>
                        <integer>1</integer>
                        <key>bInterfaceNumber</key>
                        <integer>0</integer>
                        <key>idProduct</key>
                        <integer>20483</integer>
                        <key>idVendor</key>
                        <integer>1390</integer>
                </dict>


[ Reply to This | # ]
A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: Robert Hancock on Sep 27, '03 10:53:14PM

Many thanks iDG--I'll give it a try and report back.



[ Reply to This | # ]
A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: Robert Hancock on Sep 27, '03 11:32:12PM

iDG--you are the Wizard on this board.
I am pleased to say that logging in as root, editing the ProlificUsbSerial.kext Info.plist with your lines of code using TextEdit, saving and a reboot did the job! I now have my Elecom serial port workin with my APC Smart-UPS.

Many Many thanks indeed.

If anybody wants me to post the hacked Info.plist file for the Elecom UC-SGT (3,400 yen in Akihabara) let me know and I will put it up.

The original package from Prolific in Taiwan is the latest 1.0.7b4 package which Kevin Su emailed to me after I called them from Japan.



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A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: si on Dec 18, '03 08:40:39AM

I had a problem under OS X 10.3 (Panther) with a Manhattan USB Serial adapter using the PL-2303 chipset. The driver is intended for 10.2 but does install. After a restart an error message says the driver has not been correctly installed.

The solution is to correct the permissions and usership in /System/Library/Extentions/ProlificUSBSerial.kext

sudo su
<type your password>
chmod -R og-w /System/Library/Extentions/ProlificUSBSerial.kext <return>
chown -R root:wheel /System/Library/Extentions/ProlificUSBSerial.kext
<return>



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A patch for the Prolific USB serial driver
Authored by: TeeGate on Jan 28, '06 04:52:02AM

Has anyone been able to get the INtel Mac to connect to a USBSerial driver?

Guy



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