Need Sun RJ-45 console cable

Wed Nov 27 09:02:51 PST 2002

AFAIK, RS232 is an electrical and pin function spec, but does not
include the connectors, hence the diversity.

One part of the spec says you can connect the transmitters to
either power supply indefinitely without damage. In the absence
of documentation, if you exercise reasonable sys-adminly caution,
I'd say just Go For It and plug things in, highly unlikely you'll
hurt anything from wires being crossed.

This is probably "preaching to the choir", but I'm a fan of the
Yost "wiring standard", i.e., using modular DB-9/DB-25 to RJ45 adapters
to get a consistent RJ45 pinout regardless of DTE/DCE,
9 or 25 or ? pins, etc. As long as the baud rate, bits/char and
parity match, you can then connect "anything to anything", nice
for emergencies, I've standardized on 9600 8N1.

Details are in the Red & Purple books and at
http://yost.com/computers/RJ45-serial/index.html

I have adapters for my laptop, hp200lx (makes a nice, portable
terminal) and palm 3 (as a last resort). In my goodie bag I have
two stubby 3" cables, one cable is "rolled", one "straight-thru",
and an RJ45 "phone coupler". 10baseT ethernet cables are used as
"extension cords".

With such a kit, Jim probably could have had something working
within a few minutes.

HTHs,
phil