Comm Port Troubles GA-5486AL

[KLund1]

Hi,
I got this board:

Gigabyte GA-5486AL

Gigabyte GA-5486AL is a motherboard based on the ALi M1489/87 (FinALi-486 PCI Chipset) chipset. Get specs, BIOS, documentation and more!

theretroweb.com

I have installed Win98se, but I can not get a serial mouse to work.
The comm ports, & pins in the MB are labeled. I found a serial cable header and I have the red side of that small ribbon cable connected to pin 1,2.
Both Comm 1 & 2 are enabled in the BIOS.
I have 3 serial mice, 2 Microsoft, 1 Logitech. WIN98 does not see any of them on comm 1 or 2. I do not know if these are working mice. How can I verify?
I also went through the win98 find non PnP hardware and I get nothing.
I manually installed the win98 generic serial mouse diver, and still no mouse.
I got this board bare, so it might have been retired because the comm ports died. Everything else on this board works great.

Any suggestions or ideas??
Thanks

 

[KLund1]

Quick update.
I tested all 3 mice on a Thinkpad with 98 on it.
All mice work normally.
So that eliminates one issue.

 

[schmult]

Quick update.
I tested all 3 mice on a Thinkpad with 98 on it.
All mice work normally.
So that eliminates one issue.

One method of testing the ports is to use another system with a known good serial port and the HyperTerminal program (assuming it is on both systems, should be on 98). Connect the two ports with a cable and see if the two HT programs will talk to each other. You need to solve connector gender and DTE/DCE compatibility, and make sure the COM parameters are the same at both ends. If you only have a modern laptop without a serial port, you can get cheap serial to USB adapters, then you need either HyperTerminal or a replacement.
Good luck.

 

[modem7]

I found a serial cable header and I have the red side of that small ribbon cable connected to pin 1,2.

There are at least two variations of that cable. Maybe you have the wrong one for your motherboard.

One variation, whether DB25 or DE9, has pin-1-to-pin-1, pin-2-to-pin-2, pin-3-to-pin-3, and so on.
One variation, whether DB25 or DE9, has pin-1-to-pin-1, pin-2-to-pin-3, pin-3-to-pin-5, and so on, like what is shown at [here].