Reviews of the Best PCIe Serial Port (Adapter) Cards

Very few interfaces have the rich, varied history of the serial port. They get there name from the way they transfer data. Just a single bit at a time, in a series. Serial technology laid the foundation for our modern communication protocols. USB stands for Universal Serial Bus. SATA stands for Serial ATA, which stands for Serial AT Attachment, which (strangely enough) stands for Serial Advanced Technology Attachment.

Although serial technology is still essential in modern standards, when somebody refers to a serial port they’re almost always talking about that trusty-old RS-232 standard. This standard was first introduced in the 1960’s, where owning a computer meant that you were a multimillionaire. Hardware that communicated over the RS-232 standard is still being produced to this day, most commonly found in commercial and industrial environments.

在所有这些硬件之外，令人惊讶的是，硬件制造商很少包含带有现代PC的串行端口。一些消费者甚至认为，他们必须扔掉旧的串行硬件，并用昂贵的USB等效物代替它。

幸运的是，事实并非如此。市场上有大量负担得起的PCIE串行卡。但是并非所有这些都是平等创建的。当您跨越50年的计算机历史记录时，您可以确定有很多变量正在播放。但是选择并不一定要困难。我们已经完成了市场上的三张最佳PCIE串行卡。我们将帮助您了解它们之间的差异，并选择适合您的差异。

startech.com PCIE RS232串行适配器卡

如果你一直跟上我们,你会surely be familiar with StarTech.com hardware. This company specializes in hard to find cables and interfaces, focusing on affordability and reliability. But there is a specific reason we regularly feature their brand. This is one of the few hardware companies registered with the International Standards Organization 9001 designation. Their hardware meets all international standards, providing superior compatibility even with rare or hard to find hardware.

可用选项

虽然他们的标准卡是simple two port PCIe card，几乎所有应用程序都有许多选项。您可以在1到16个端口的任何地方获得他们的卡。如果您要购买四个或更多端口，您会发现他们的卡在背面带有专有连接器，但要包含一条突破电缆，该电缆将单个端口转换为适当数量的女性RS232端口

如果您有一个紧凑的集成系统，则可能有半高的PCIE端口。在这种情况下，您将可以购买低调型号。这些可在一两个端口卡中使用。两个端口低调卡将端口划分为两个背板，因此它将占据两张PCIE卡的空间。

Compatibility

All of StarTech.com’s serial card options use the PCIe 1.0 standard. They only operate on a single bus, but they will work in any port size from 1x to 16x. This card is designed for use primarily with the Windows operating system. There are official drivers available for every Windows OS from XP to 10.

One of the most unique features of the card is the ability for IRQ sharing. IRQ stands for interrupt request. This is an old technology that allows the software to tell the hardware that it wants to communicate with a specific device installed in your computer. (Any one else remember setting your sound card IRQ to 16 to get your shiny new sound blaster working in Duke Nukem?)

Today, there are too many devices to give each one of them a specific IRQ that is addressable by older, 16 bit software. But this card supports IRQ sharing. This allows old devices to work with modern hardware, something that you won’t often find. If you still have any DOS era peripherals or plan to use 16 bit software in a virtual machine, this card is the perfect choice.

Performance

Now, to convert the serial signal to something the PCIe bus can understand, there needs to be a chip to interpret the communication. This is done through the 16C1050 UART chipset. Many cards use a single controller that the serial ports share, but this one has two dedicated chips. This reduces load on your CPU, and keeps performance snappy.

Towards the tail end of the serial port era, there were some high speed devices available that required bandwidth of up to 460 Kbps. Although they are rare, this is one of the few cards that supports this bandwidth. This is important to note for anyone who has more recently developed serial hardware, as you’ll want your PCIe card to support the format.

IO Crest PCI-Express 4-Port DB9 Serial (RS232) Card

IO Crest, as a company, seems almost deceptive in nature. At first, they look like your regular, everyday, bargain brand. The name sounds almost and unfamiliar. Their products are affordable. But what you don’t realize is that IO Crest is huge. They’re one of the most well used hardware manufacturers. Their products are sold to white label vendors, and can be found in computers sold by big-name brands. The takeaway is that they offer value. You get their products at the price of low end brands, but you get that big-brand quality and reliability you need.

可用选项

这standard modeloffers more value than you’re used to seeing at this price point. It includes not one, but four serial ports. Two of them are attached directly onto the card itself, while the other two come in the form of headers. They include a second face plate with ribbon cables that plugs into the card. Although they take up another backplate slot in your computer, there is no obligation to use them if you don’t need them. The choice is yours.

其他选项可用于唯一系统。您可以使用集成系统和一些服务器中常见的迷你PCIE插槽。PCI版本可用于经典系统，甚至还有一个通用USB串行中心，尽管该模型有一些带宽的限制。

Compatibility

This is one of the better supported cards on the market. It works out of the box with Windows XP through 10, and has Linux compatibility. Because this card is bone-standard, some linux distributions (Ubuntu, or any other Debian based distribution, for example) have driver packages directly through the Apt repository.

One of the most important aspects of this card is support for UART standards. These standards are often used in manufacturing, and conformance is critical to the operation of expensive hardware.

Performance

Just like the top-tier cards on the market, this particular card supports high speed data transfer rates. Across all four ports, a total of 128 Kbps is available. This, alone, acts as a clear indicator that there are four separate controllers on this card. None of the ports are sharing channels, and none of the communication is offloaded to your CPU. This means that you’re not going to have any performance issues, even with complicated hardware.

SYBA串行DB9 RS232 PCIE X1卡

If you’re looking for the cheap and cheerful alternative to expensive, high end cards, Syba is the brand you’ll want to look for. For 90% of users, all you need is a basic card to connect standard serial hardware. Syba knows what most consumers need, so they can remove unneeded features to make hardware that is more affordable than competing products.

可用选项

Although there is onlyone card available，Syba设法涵盖了多种用法方案。标准计算机将使用该亚洲官方合作伙伴卡。如果您需要低调的卡片，则有两个单独的背板可用。您可以使用带有单个串行端口的单个背板，也可以在另一个串行端口中安装第二个。尽管主背板是全尺寸的，但卡本身是半高的，可确保任何系统的兼容性。

Compatibility

该卡与Windows和Linux操作系统兼容。它具有MCS9922芯片组，通常在许多主板上发现。这意味着每个现代操作系统都应立即支持它，无需安装驱动程序。但是，一旦脱颖而出的事情不是操作系统的兼容性，而是硬件兼容性。它具有完整的256个字节FIFO支持，表明它可以依次提供大量数据而不会出现错误或正时问题。它还具有UART的支持，在这个价格点几乎是闻所未闻的。

Performance

This card does have a dedicated hardware interpreter chip, but this is shared between two separate ports. If you’re using a high speed serial device, you can only use a single port. Fortunately, most devices don’t operate at full speed. This allows the bandwidth to be divided up between the two ports, maintaining your high performance.

Which PCIe Serial Card is Right For Me?

Not sure which one to buy? Most of them operate on the same PCIe bus, and most work with the Windows operating system. The one you choose will depend primarily on the number of ports you want to use and the type of hardware that you’ll be running.

If you’re running oddball or high performance hardware, then you likely don’t want to take a risk knowing that one card might not work. In that case, consider thestartech.com PCIE RS232串行适配器卡。这张卡是制造最精美的，并且可以满足市场上的每个RS-232标准。这为其提供了卓越的兼容性和高于平均水平的可靠性。尽管它比某些价格高一些，但成本仍然很低。但是，这张卡片在包括IRQ共享的地方。这使旧样式软件可以在现代计算环境中正确地解决旧硬件。在硬件涉及的情况下，任何与此卡无法使用的东西都可能永远不会与现代PC一起使用。

想要四个高速串行端口吗？这IO波峰pci - express并DB9系列卡is for you. This model has not one, but four dedicated controllers, each with it’s own port. This means that every port has full bandwidth, so you’re not going to find performance lagging when you have multiple devices plugged in. This is most important for hardware that runs on a timing system, since getting data delivered at exactly the right moment is a crucial part of having this hardware work.

Just need something basic? TheSYBA串行DB9 RS232 PCIE X1卡绝对是您清单上最好的爆炸。如果您有一个高速串行设备，则此卡将完美工作。如果您有两个标准速度设备，那么您仍然很幸运。对于90％的消费者需要，这张卡可以通过。实际上，如果您需要半高度的卡，您甚至不必订购特殊版本。免费包含的支架为您服务。这张卡是相当裸露的骨头，但更多的是您所需要的。