Getting the Prolific USB serial adapter working with Windows 8 can be difficult. Especially if you are studying for CCNA and you need to access a 2960G switch on Windows with Putty. As strange as it may look, you need an outdated driver to make it work.

Jun 1, 2013 - For years, I had ran my Prolific USB to Serial cable from my Windows. After upgrading Windows 7 to 64bit I tried to install the drivers from. After wasting 2 hours trying to get this working in Windows I powered up Linux Mint. Bus 005 Device 002: ID 067b:2303 Prolific Technology, Inc. PL2303 Serial Port. However, in Linux Mint this is not happening. This list is blank. In terminal if I type lsusb I get Bus 002 Device 007: ID 067b:2303 Prolific Technology, Inc. PL2303 Serial Port When I do. [ 79.894335] usb 2-2.2: pl2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0. If it does not, then the driver is not loading properly.

The only working version I have found is 3.3.2.102, which you can find at this link: After installing this driver, you need to force this driver version by going to device manager, choose update driver by right clicking on the Prolific adapter, then choose “browse my computer for driver software”, then “let me pick”. On the next window, it should show you different versions of the driver, and you need to choose version 3.3.2.102. This will get the device working on Windows. Prolific driver update. The Prolific driver is now configured in Windows 8 Enterprise. Updating the Prolific driver in Device Manager. Now we force the installation of the installed driver and configure our device for use.

For years, I had ran my Prolific USB to Serial cable from my Windows 32bit laptop without any issues. Unfortunately, life when running Windows is never easy. After upgrading Windows 7 to 64bit I tried to install the drivers from CNET downloads. This was a HUGE mistake. Even though the CNET downloader told me it was downloading at 28K in the background it was installing 8 (yes 8 plugins and other useless crap) onto all my browsers. Finally after cleaning up my machine and finding the drivers from a source not intent in filling my machine full of rubbish I discovered that the drivers fail to work correctly for Windows 7 64bit based platforms. Back to square 1.

Cosmic compiler stm8. After wasting 2 hours trying to get this working in Windows I powered up Linux Mint. Loaded the necessary kernel module and tested. All in all 20 minutes taken. So high five to Linux and I certainly wont be using CNET downloads again! So what are the steps? Steps Connect the cable via USB. Next, run 'lsusb'.

Admin@server ~ $ lsusb Bus 002 Device 002: ID 090c:37a2 Silicon Motion, Inc. - Taiwan (formerly Feiya Technology Corp.) Bus 005 Device 002: ID 067b:2303 Prolific Technology, Inc. PL2303 Serial Port Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub Then load the kernel module via the following command. Note: To ensure this survives a reboot append this line to '/etc/modules' admin@server ~ $ sudo modprobe usbserial vendor=0x 067b product=0x 2303 You should now see that it is now showing as attached by running 'dmesg'. Admin@server ~ $ dmesg [ 131.747013] USB Serial support registered for pl2303 [ 131.747038] pl2303 5-1:1.0: >pl2303 converter detected [ 131.758965] usb 5-1: >pl2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0 Finally, you will need to connect through to serial device /dev/ttyUSB0. This easiest way to do this is via 'minicom'. Once you have issued the following command it will present you with a menu.

Change (within the 'serial port setup' option) the service device to /dev/ttyUSB0 and any other settings i.e baud rate etc. Then select the exit option and you be connected to your serial device. Admin@server ~ $ sudo minicom -s.