Serial devices are controlled by a Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter, or UART for short. This specialized integrated circuit is found either on the device adapter card or on the motherboard (for those that have a serial port mounted on it). The UART chip controls all the actions and functions of the serial port, including the list below. |
Controlling all the connectors' pins and their associated signals. |
Establishing the communication protocol. |
| Converting the parallel data bits of the data bus into a serial bit stream for transmission.
|
Converting the received serial bit stream into parallel data for transmission over the PC's internal bus. |