What Do You Use For Serial Communications?

[RTek23]

Teraterm for general purpose hyperterm replacement use, but realterm for playing down with the fiddly bits of micro's. Realterm provides lots of control, including sending pre-canned strings, multi-format decodes, etc. Both free, but appeals to slightly different uses, one pretty high level, and the other for playing in the serial weeds. And unfortunately, I suspect serial will be around for some time, although some Mfr's are seeing the light of the next generation. Ken

[Lost User]

I saw Putty on an Arduino site couple of years ago and downloaded it. Still using it for GPS and Arduino. Very easy to use.

Peter Wasser Art is making something out of nothing and selling it. Frank Zappa

[Mike Hankey]

I had Putty but when I reloaded my machine I didn't put it back on, using Tera Term now it's simple and I don't use it a lot. Best all around Arduino site I've found is AVRFreak, been a member for a couple of years.

VS2010/Atmel Studio 6.1 ToDo Manager Extension Relax...We're all crazy it's not a competition!

[NormDroid]

I wrote my own called NTerm using WPF, I use it for Cisco appliances.

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[glennPattonWork3]

I wrote my own using the serial port class (that led to an article here Serial Comms in C# for Beginners[^], why did M$ give up with shipping HyperTerminal with new versions of Windows's. When first setting up a PC we have to install HyperTerm Private edition (and pray the licence we have has not expired!)

[Nicholas Marty]

I use Hercules[^] whenever I need one of the following: Serial Communication, TCP Client, TCP Server, UDP Communication It's free and doesn't require an installation (standalone exe)

[altomaltes]

putty, minimal, no annoying and only makes sessions in you want. The fantastic program wich does not put his hands in your pocket.

[Prune etna]

Hterm [] works for me. I haven't compared it to other emulators mentioned here so I can't claim that it's the best, but it talks to PIC micros over USBser.sys conveniently without fuss. Also python's serial module is pretty easy to use if you fancy writing your own interface instead of using a terminal emulator.

[jpcmonteiro]

I've used Hercules (http://www.hw-group.com/products/hercules/index_en.html[^]) in the past. It's very nice as a serial terminal, as well as a simple TCP server/client.

[code_junkie]

I copy hypertrm.exe and hypertrm.dll from an old XP box to a directory on the new box...

[msb198]

I still use HyperTerminal. I grabbed hypertrm.exe and hypertrm.dll off my XP machine and have them on a flash drive to use on my Windows 7 laptop. I also run an XP VM within Windows 7, so I can connect my USB to Serial adapter to the VM and use HyperTerminal there. If anyone's interested, I use the B&B Electronics Model 232USB9M for all my automation equipment and haven't had any problems. When laptops first stopped including serial ports, we had some converters that were a little temperamental. Also, while we're talking ancient comms, anyone that still needs to program a PLC-5 or anything else using a PCMCIA card on a modern laptop, I bought an ExpressCard to PCMCIA adapter from shopdigi.com and it works flawlessly. It looks cheap and there's no brand name on the packaging, but my Allen Bradley 1784-PCMK card works with it.

[User 10408884]

I have used several over the years. The best I found for my needs is Anzio. I use it daily. It is reliable and full of features that you would not expect to find in an emulator. The author has done an amaing job. http://www.anzio.com/product/anziowin[^]

[Bitbeisser]

RealTerm or now more and more PuTTY. Never really cared about HyperTerminal, just used this on customer's PCs if nothing else was available... ;P RS232 and RS485 aren't likely ever to die, they just work, are simple to implement and specially the later has features that other, newer technologies just can't compete with (try connecting to a device 1km away, for a reasonable amount of money)...:thumbsup:

[gggustafson]

I've written an application that performs serial communication. Its screen shot is Serial Port IO[^]. Although I would not characterize it as a commercial quality serial communications interface, it does come with source code if desired. If there is any interest, I'll write a Code Project article and include the details.

Gus Gustafson

[Matt McGuire]

I spent an hour crawing the web a couple years ago for a replacement, thought about it for a moment and spent a few minutes more to make a basic one. Every once in a while I make improvements as the need requires. Some might argue that buying one is more cost effective, but something a basic as hyper terminal is a wash when you figure you still need to test potental software to see if it will work for you.

[BradAlderton]

I also use ClearTerminal http://www.clearconnex.com/content/clearterminal[^] as David said its easy and FREE :laugh:

[Nick Alexeev]

SIOW It's an obscure terminal programs, which comes with a CCS compiler for PICs.