Waveshare RS232 Board SP3232 RS232 Communication Module Kit Development Board SP3232 COM/UART port

Even though USB is the defacto standard these days, there are still times when RS232 is needed.This well-designed little module is simple to use and allows Raspberry Pis and Arduinos to make the connection. It's so small it mounts easily on top off the Raspi case.

I used to work with hardware, back in the early days of my career. I haven't played with hardware for embedded system for over 20 years, but I recently had a need for a RS-232 connection to an embedded system I'm working on. I saw the Waveshare RS232 Board come across my data feed and decided to give it a try. My impressions:- This thing is small! It's based on the Sipex SP3232 chip, with a bit of glue logic to make it all work.- It comes with a standard DB-9 connector for external connections, and a 6-pin header for interfacing with a controller board.- There is no documentation with the board. Worse, there is a link to downloadable documentation on one of the embedded images on the product page, but no way to click it, because it's not a true link. Additionally, the print is so small that those of us with advanced experience (e.g. old) cannot make out the words. I had to google the product title to find the wiki page containing the information. Bad!This little board looks like it will do what I need for my embedded project. It's small and complete, assuming you can find the associated documentation to make it work. Recommended for those that need an RS-232 interface and have good eyes.

I used this RS232 board to allow me to control some AV equipment that only supported serial control via an ESP32 over wifi. It took some work, but now I can fully control my HDMI matrix switcher with an ESP32 that feeds into home assistant. Documentation is basically non-existent, but if you're doing what I did you've got a pretty good idea how this is supposed to work. I'm really happy with how this little board worked and it saved me from buying a proprietary controller from the manufacturer.