Usb to ttl cable for only US$ 3

Hello:
This is a link of the project
[www.uchobby.com]
Bye

hey now this is useful! i recently got a full series 3 kit and steppers from makerbot but forgot the damn cable. shipping is about $30 to australia, so would have cost me $60aud for a single cable.

good find. +1

ooo, found an old motorola cable that looks promising, it has six wires in it, well 5 and a shield, so will have a crack at this. not entirely sure what i'm doing but can't really lose...

They're only 3.3v, don't know if they could be used for ICSP programming, plus they don't have RTS or CTS signals.

well i did say i don't know what i'm doing...

ok, next thing: is there a simple circuit i can build that will do what the cable does to which i can attach a usb socket?

and on another note, i think its an idea to put a usb socket on the motherboard, or at least have an option for it. i'm more into the mechanics of all this. second moment of inertia or flexure analysis i get, but i have little clue what the voltage levels are meant to be for ttl and why its different and necessary.

The mobile phone data cable hack is the cheapest where you can find the cables cheap.

You don't actually need RTS, CTS etc if you are prepared to operate the reset by hand (Press button) ocasionally.

You only actualy realy need RX, TX and Gnd connection.

A lot of the FTDI USB/Serial cables are 3.5v but 5v tolerant ie you can use them in both.

For the Mobile phone cables they are so cheap that you can afford to expend one or two until you get one that that is both 5v tolerant (I have yet to find one that isn't but haven't tried that many really).

If you are really stuck and have only a standard rs232 serial port available (9 or 25 pin) make up a converter board using something like a MAX232 RS232 to ttl converter chip. They are relatively inexpensive. But not as cheap as a hacked mobile cable once you total up all the parts and labour. I have used this route as well for talking to arduino based boards.

Hope this helps.

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Necessity hopefully becomes the absentee parent of successfully invented children.

Would these be a good alternative to USB-TTL?
1) [www.robotshop.ca]
2) [www.robotshop.ca]

It almost seems like you can just connect 1) directly to the Motherboard, then use a USB to USB cable.

It is basically the same as an FTDI 3.3v USB Serial Cable without the cable.

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Necessity hopefully becomes the absentee parent of successfully invented children.

There is another post some where here recomending a Nokia CA-42 cable.

I located one on Ebay for 99p / $0.5 including P&P waiting for it to arrive possibly this week or next from HongKong.

It had this Item number # 200403418373
Description USB DATA CABLE CA-42 FOR NOKIA 3100/3120/7360/7250/6822

I bought only one to try out but will buy at least a couple more so I can stop having to swap my $20 FTDI lead between my 3 non Audrino Processor boards.

With a little searching and some creative thought you can build your 3D printer for a lot less!

I will let yall know how I get on when it arrives.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/01/2009 09:23PM by BodgeIt.

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Bodge It [reprap.org]
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