You need to do more testing.  If the app is started up by hand after the
computer is fully booted, then do you ever have a similar problem
(nevermind 1 out of 10 times)?  (ie, not autoloaded)

Is there special software (other than a device driver) that the serial
card uses that is loaded in the registry RUN, startup, etc?

If, as you postulate, the problem is that the program is loading before
windows finishes intitializing the serial driver then you likely only
have two options - either modify the app to detect when it is configured
incorrectly and rety the connection until it works, or make a seperate
program that determines when the serial port is working and then lauches
your app.

Either way I'd spend some time figuring out whether the program loads
fine after a full boot by hand a few dozen times just to make sure it
isn't another problem - best to determine the real cause then fix it
than to try and fix phantom causes.

-Adam


Tom Messenger wrote:

>Hoping someone on this list knows the answer to this...
>
>We have a software ap running on a notebook computer with Windows2000
>system. There is a pcmcia card with a serial port stuck in to interface to
>external hardware. The customer has it setup to startup automatically into
>the application program.
>
>The problem is that about 10% of the time, the program starts up and either
>hasn't found the plugin card yet or it somehow gets configured wrong. Then
>the program runs but won't allow comms. The user must exit the program and
>restart it.
>
>It appears to be simply due to how windows starts up and how/when/where it
>recognizes the plugin card. If this is so, does anyone know how to control
>this behavior so the card is found 100% of the time?
>
>Thanks,
>Tom M.
>
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