[Nut-upsuser] Tripp Lite Smart Pro SMX1500SLT / SMARTINT1500 - not identified via serial port

[Charles Lepple]

On Sep 19, 2010, at 8:40 AM, z6 wrote:

> I have an SMX1500SLT running on USB just fine. I not want to buy/add  
> a SMARTINT1500. However before doing so I was trying to make sure  
> there was a chance it would work under Nut.
>
> The SMX1500SLT has both serial and USB, but the SMARTINT1500 has  
> only serial. I was therefore trying to switch the SMX1500SLT to  
> serial to ensure the server comms were ok, and that there was some  
> chance that the SMARTINT1500 would work. But...
>
> The Nut Tripplite driver will not communicate with the SMX1500SLT on  
> the serial port. It just says that it failed to identify a ups.     
> Using strace I can see it trying a number of times to send :W to the  
> serial port, but nothing comes back. To check the port and cable I  
> ran up the Tripp Lite PALD program, which did communicate ok over  
> the serial port.

The serial tripplite driver is much older than tripplite_usb, and  
seems to be designed for a single protocol which is no longer in use.  
The tripplite_usb driver checks to see what protocol is being used  
with ":\0", but that framework hasn't been ported to the older driver.

> I'm not too worried about using the existing SMX1500SLT on serial -  
> it works just fine on USB. My question is whether I will be able to  
> use the SMARTINT1500 at all... It actually has two serial ports -  
> one for full operation and one for contact only. Obviously I really  
> want to have the full operation...
>
> Anyone know if the SMARTINT1500 is going to work?

The tripplite* drivers were not developed using an official protocol  
specification. They are essentially stopgap solutions for the case  
where you already have a large installed base, and something is better  
than nothing.

If you are buying new hardware which should be compatible with NUT,  
you might want to consider another manufacturer which either publishes  
their communication specifications, or uses an industry standard.

Our hardware compatibility list doesn't yet have a "greater than"  
operator for the support column, but this query will narrow it down to  
just serial models and drivers:

http://buildbot.networkupstools.org/~buildbot/docs/latest/website/stable-hcl.html?connection=Serial