Olga Weis
Last updated Jan 25, 2023
UART or Universal Asynchronous Receiver / Transmitter is a very simple protocol that allows for the asynchronous data exchange between two devices. It generally forms part of an integrated circuit (IC) and one or more UART peripherals can be combined in microcontroller chips. The chip would typically include a processor, memory component, and input/output peripherals.
UART works with two cables – with UART1 – the controlling device such as the CPU transmits parallel data which is converted into serial format. This is transferred to UART2 which transforms the data back to parallel format and transmits that to the receiving device.
UART starts reading incoming bits when it identifies a start bit, the frequency at which the data is read is known as the baud rate, which is measured in bits per seconds (bps). The baud rates of the receiving and transmitting modules should be similar for the best tunneling performance.
By sharing your UART over the network, you allow any serial port to be accessed remotely over LAN or the Internet. Serial to Ethernet can be achieved using software or hardware options.
One of the most popular software options for sharing UART over Ethernet is FlexiHub. The service offers an effective method of implementing serial communication over Ethernet without the addition of extra hardware or cables.
Another useful software for sharing UART to Ethernet is Serial to Ethernet Connector. It offers support for USB and serial port connections, and can use TCP, RDP, UDP and Citrix protocols. You can share your serial ports on the server side so that it becomes available to any number of remote computers. If you create a client connection, the client can initiate the connection between a physical or virtual serial port on the server. The IP address of the remote host is the only information that is required for the data exchange.
Single License: For a once off payment of $259.95, this plan allows you to share and connect to remote ports from only one computer.
Single License for Virtual Machines: This option best suits users of virtual machines. The one off cost is $799.95
Corporate licenses are customized according to each customer’s needs.
There are a few hardware options available for transmitting serial data. UART TO ETH is a module that uses TTL to Ethernet. Transistor-Transistor Logic (TTL) is the most commonly used data receiver/transmitter protocol and the main differences between TTL and RS232 is the voltage levels at which they operate and their logic levels. A UART to Ethernet converter allows you to remotely manage a device as if it was physically connected to your computer allowing you to create a customized UART over Ethernet module.
If you need to convert TCP or UDP socket data to serial UART, you can use a data transmission appliance (USR-TC232-T).
You can control your Raspberry Pi using the general-purpose input/output (GPIO) digital signal pin on the integrated circuit board or use the serial console to access the kernel boot messages with UART. You can also connect and interface with other devices like Arduino, ESP8266 etc.
In order to connect your Raspberry Pi to UART, you need to enable UART connection and connect your RPi to UART Bridge. A UART bridge translates the data that is sent and received between different devices.
Open the Computer Management function on your computer. Connect your UART Bridge with the relevant COM/LPT ports. A driver for the virtual COM port may be required.
By using Putty or another Terminal app, you can configure your serial connection and determine basic settings like baud rate, parity, stop bits etc. Enable logging and specify the log file name and location. All session output will be saved to this log file.
UART to Ethernet is all about allowing devices to communicate. It is a physical component inside a microcontroller and its primary role is to send and receive serial data. When it becomes necessary to share UART to Ethernet, there are software and hardware options available to make this possible. For smaller organizations, where only a few connections are required, the hardware option may make more financial sense, but the software solution offers more flexibility.
