Keyspan USB Serial interface

Gone are the days where we have laptops that have a built in physical serial port for connecting a serial cable directly to the back of the box.  This is also becoming if not already a standard in desktop boards also.  Dell and other major computer manufactures have stopped shipping computers with serial interfaces.  For a system administrator this is at least an inconvenience and at most a panic attack when you don’t have a laptop lying around with a serial connector in a crisis situation where you need to connect to a router or a switch.  I wanted to write a quick post about a serial to USB adapter that I have been using for quite some time now and has been more than satisfactory.

The unit is made by KEYSPAN who have recently been bought out by Tripp-Lite.  The product description from them is “USB High Speed Serial Adapter” and the model number is “USA-19HS.”  I had used my original Keyspan so many times before, it is virtually without number.  Recently, I decided to pick up another unit from Newegg.  The unit works great with Windows 7 also which is a requirement in my environment and also plays nicely with TeraTerm which I also use.

You can read more about the specifications of the product directly from Tripp-Lite here: https://www.tripplite.com/en/products/model.cfm?txtModelID=3914

 

Final Thoughts

This is a must have device in the bag of tools for the system administrator who find him or herself in frequent need of connecting to routers, switches, and other console cable driven devices.  Even if you do not regulary need this type of connection, it is great to keep one close as you will never know when you might be in need of connecting directly to certain network devices.