Are your I/O plates (ribbon cable + port assemblies) original to the motherboard? Mobo header pinouts can vary.

All I can suggest is to use the Microsoft driver version 9.01 from here: https://winworldpc.com/product/microsoft-mouse/9x

That's if you haven't tried that version yet.

Does comtest say that COM1: is at 3F8h and IRQ 4, and COM2: is at 2F8h and IRQ 3? Or something different?
It looks like your board also has a PS/2 mouse port. I wonder if the mouse drivers are confused by that also being there. Are you passing a /S1 or /S2 option to CuteMouse to force it to use a serial mouse?
And you're sure that "Mouse Systems" mode is wrong? e.g. you tried EDIT or some other DOS program that supports a mouse afterward.

Pierre32 wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:00:

Are your I/O plates (ribbon cable + port assemblies) original to the motherboard? Mobo header pinouts can vary.

Nope, the cables aren't original to the mobo, but are to the controller card... this is where it gets confusing. If the pinouts on the mobo are different, then perhaps the controller card won't make a difference? If the IC's that control how the COM channels communicate with the the rest of the system (regardless of whether or not it's from the mobo or a separate controller) are expecting a certain pin configuration, then maybe that's why a different controller card doesn't matter. I'm not an engineer unfortunately..

If this is the case then, is there a good place to find out, what kind of cable to use, or if I need to make one, what the pinout is?

halate wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:32:

Nope, the cables aren't original to the mobo, but are to the controller card... this is where it gets confusing. If the pinouts on the mobo are different, then perhaps the controller card won't make a difference? If the IC's that control how the COM channels communicate with the the rest of the system (regardless of whether or not it's from the mobo or a separate controller) are expecting a certain pin configuration, then maybe that's why a different controller card doesn't matter. I'm not an engineer unfortunately..

If this is the case then, is there a good place to find out, what kind of cable to use, or if I need to make one, what the pinout is?

I thought you said the mouse+controller card combination works fine on another system. You're using the same cable on this machine as on the one where it works, right?

jakethompson1 wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:34:

halate wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:32:

Nope, the cables aren't original to the mobo, but are to the controller card... this is where it gets confusing. If the pinouts on the mobo are different, then perhaps the controller card won't make a difference? If the IC's that control how the COM channels communicate with the the rest of the system (regardless of whether or not it's from the mobo or a separate controller) are expecting a certain pin configuration, then maybe that's why a different controller card doesn't matter. I'm not an engineer unfortunately..

If this is the case then, is there a good place to find out, what kind of cable to use, or if I need to make one, what the pinout is?

I thought you said the mouse+controller card combination works fine on another system. You're using the same cable on this machine as on the one where it works, right?

Sorry for the confusion. Yeah, when I use the controller card. I'm using the same cable, as the one with the system that works 😀

That motherboard has type B serial connectors, the Goldstar Prime 2C has type A. So using the same cable definitely won't work on both of them. But at least one combination should be working...

jakethompson1 wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:22:

Does comtest say that COM1: is at 3F8h and IRQ 4, and COM2: is at 2F8h and IRQ 3? Or something different?
It looks like your board also has a PS/2 mouse port. I wonder if the mouse drivers are confused by that also being there. Are you passing a /S1 or /S2 option to CuteMouse to force it to use a serial mouse?
And you're sure that "Mouse Systems" mode is wrong? e.g. you tried EDIT or some other DOS program that supports a mouse afterward.

Yep, it says exactly that. I've tried /S1 and it says "Installed at COM1 (03F8h/IRQ4) in Mouse Systems mode." ...with /S2 ... Installed a COM2 (o2F8h/IRQ3) in Mouse System mode.
Tried 'edit' afterward, with no success.. in v1.9.1.
In V2.1 beta4, it just says "Error: device not found"

Dmetsys wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:04:

All I can suggest is to use the Microsoft driver version 9.01 from here: https://winworldpc.com/product/microsoft-mouse/9x

That's if you haven't tried that version yet.

I can give that a go, I'll try tomorrow.

jmarsh wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:48:

That motherboard has type B serial connectors, the Goldstar Prime 2C has type A. So using the same cable definitely won't work. But at least one combination should be working...

Interesting. I'll dig around and see if yet another cable will work, like you said, it should be working....

Bizarre, only thing I can think of is could something be wrong somewhere between the -12V output of your power supply and the serial interface. Are you using an ATX with an adapter? It should still work though. It's -5V, not -12V, that new power supplies are missing.

halate wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:55:

jmarsh wrote on 2020-10-27, 04:48:

That motherboard has type B serial connectors, the Goldstar Prime 2C has type A. So using the same cable definitely won't work. But at least one combination should be working...

Interesting. I'll dig around and see if yet another cable will work, like you said, it should be working....

Yes, I have a FIC Socket 7 motherboard and it uses the "Intel/DTK" pinout for the serial ports, which is the less common one vs. the "AT/Everex" pinout which is used in most boards. More info here:

RS-232 PC Serial Port Pinout Conventions

You can easily tell which pinout is used on your motherboard by checking with a multimeter whether pin 5 or 9 is connected to ground.

Thanks so much for everyone's help so far, much appreciated.

- I'm using an AT power supply. I'll check to make sure the -12v is being supplied.. but, this PSU does work with that other motherboard+controller card, for the mouse.
- I'll give the MS Driver 9.01 a try as a shot in the dark.
- Pinout Weirdness: I'll check the pinout of the ports, but to be honest, I'm not sure how, I'll have to google it. Bought a Klein tools multimeter, so as to start checking these things as I get more into retro tech.
- PS/2 Port: On this board there is no physical port, but oddly, there are what appear to be jumper configurations for: "Internal Keyboard with Ps/2", "Internal Keyboard without pS/2", "External controller", but I assumed this was keyboard only.

I'll report back after I've had a chance to exhaust all the above option. Might be a bit, got other priorities at the moment. But again thanks so much!

This is a Gigabyte manual but many settings are are same across VLB motherboards.
https://mbmanuals.retropc.se/manuals/47/486vs8a.pdf

Also there is an ISA serial port card available that works with any motherboard. I think it is from Startech.

Common motherboard settings.

Hey,

Sooo I figured it out -- with the help of you fine folk! A couple things:
1. Confirmed the the pinout on the mobo is different. (It's type-b). The ribbon cables connecting the DB9 Port were for type-A.
2. The reason why it wasn't working, even with a separate controller card, is because the ribbon cable itself (that was previously working perfectly on a different computer), had broken half way through my tests. The solder points inside the DB9 connector had failed. I guess that's part of the game, with 27 year old retro tech.

Last thing I gotta do electrically, is hook up the external battery (or solder on a coin cell holder). Oddly this mobo I think was supposed to have DALLAS RTC, but no sign of it. The other odd part is the solder points for the cell battery holder, are much closer together than they normally would be for say a 2032 cell holder. I'm willing to bet it was potentially setup to be used with a 1220 (same 3v spec), and 12MM coin cell holder... buuut I've never seen that before.. have any of you seen this?

Thanks again for everyone's help!

Just some pics if ya like:

I'll probably make some kind of custom drive bay enclosure for the CF / SD Card adapters so there's not a big ugly hole where there should be nice face plates.