Here’s a way to get you PL2303-based Serial-USB adapter working with OS X Lion (10.7). Based on the osx-pl2303 project on github, I’ve built a kernel extension that works with OS X Lion. You can grab the kext file here or from the link below.
Installing the kext file can be done in a few easy steps:
- download and extract
- cd /path/to/osx-pl2303.kext
- cp -R osx-pl2303.kext /System/Library/Extensions/
- next you need to fix permissions and execute bits:
cd /System/Library/Extensions
chmod -R 755 osx-pl2303.kext
chown -R root:wheel osx-pl2303.kext - cd /System/Library/Extensions
- kextload ./osx-pl2303.kext
- kextcache -system-cache
Good luck!
Great work, would it be possible for you to send your changes as a pull request to the github project?
Good suggestion. I’ve sent a pull-request to the github project I’ve forked from.
Thanks. I thought I was going to have to move my serial port programs to my mac mini.
Thank you! Works for me on Lion. Been frustrated with this since the upgrade.
Got the source from sourceforge, opened in xcode4, and it wouldn’t even build. Thanks for doing the work! Much appreciated.
thanks a lot
BTW, i think u hav misspelled the word in “kextload ./osx-pl2302.kext”. it is suppose to be 2303 right??
Thanks for noticing! Edited.
Grate thanks for your grate work.
Thank you so much! That saved me a very ugly weekend of work…!
Well done. Very sad since the upgrade. You save my job
Thank you so much.
thank you for this updated 64 bit driver…. i followed your directions and my Prolific PL2303 works just fine now in Lion (tested using SecureCRT for Mac and it sees the driver and can talk to it).
Also for anyone who was using Z-Term for Mac this does not work in Lion (no PowerPC support). I had to switch to SecureCRT just for serial-based terminal connections.
Rich
They have a new lion compatible Z term universal binary out now. Google it
I had this running until my OS X Lion upgrade. I could not get it working all day and found your post. Thanks! Took me all day to find you and glad I did. Fixed me in about 3 minutes!!! Great work!!!
You da man!… man!
Awesome, solved my problem. Spent hours trying to get the official prolific driver to work, but with no luck. Your solutions works like a charm!
Thanks Martijn!
Just what I needed to get my USB serial adapter working.
Wow — thanks, Martijn. Finally, got this working!
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Hi,
I tried to remove this from my system with no luck. Here’s what I ran with the accompanying error. Can anyone help here, thanks.
sudo kextunload /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/
Password:
(kernel) Kext nl.bjaelectronics.driver.PL2303 not found for unload request.
Failed to unload nl.bjaelectronics.driver.PL2303 – (libkern/kext) not found.
You do not probably have osx-pl2303.kext load in your kernel.
Try in Terminal
kextstat
Then find in a list nl.bjaelectronics.driver.PL2303. If it is not there
you do not need unload this kext driver.
Nice one! Just made my UPS work. Thank you….
Nice, works great.
Saved the day
Good job. I’ve lost 3 hrs yesterday fighting with original driver. This one installed in a matter of seconds. Another reason not to boot windows virtual machine
Thank you VERY MUCH!…this saved the day.
Super, this is great, thanks a lot.
For those who were using ZTerm and found it not to work under Lion, I’ve switched to CoolTerm, which seems to work just fine, and with the 2303 too.
Thanks again,
Toby
thanks a lot!!!
Well done–worked perfectly for me. Was the last item on my Lion compatibility checklist. Thanks!
This is exactly what I was looking for.
Things are working great, thanks for your help!
i am not able to work with COM PORT on my Lion os.
when i execute above steps , “kextload ./osx-pl2303.kext ” is not working on my machine.
please help me as soon as possible…..
Sure you have a Prolific PL-2303 based USB-Serial adapter?
ya i have PL-2303 based USB-Serial adapter.
try to do it with sudo command
it work for me, with out – doesn’t work
i have tried with sudo still its not working.
i need solution please help me.
i have one doubt if i use RS232 cable it works fine with mac os 10.6 but if i use it with 10.7 it does not work. so is there any cable issues with Mac os Lion? Lion required particular cable for com port ? is there any permission issues with Lion??
so you did a great work
Thanks! I got it working because of your post.
This was a lifesaver, thank you!
Struggled for hours trying to download from Prolific directly, but that didn’t work.
Ditto on lifesaver!
This post helped me find an adapter that worked and then get the driver installed without breaking my USB ports.
Thank you, I was pulling my hair out trying to get MacDive working on Lion with a USB/Serial to download dives.
One thing that did throw me was no mention of having to SUDO to copy, chmod and chown. Once I’d sussed that all went fine.
I was begining to hate Apple and Lion, but things are slowly coming right again (thanks to you and others like you, rather than to Apple!).
i had a problem with cable.
finally it works….!!!
Thanks a lot..!!
Thank you very much
Man you save my day..!!
absolutely amazing, worked like a champ!!! a million thanks.
thank you. DB9 serial is still essential for my job.
I have the very same problem and its very annoying. One slight issue is that I am not a terminal guru but I can get around and follow instructions
I have downloaded the file, but when I follow the copy command I get a load of permission denied messages in lots of directories. Any help would be greatly received – ideally via instruction format
Mac-Prompt$ ls
osx-pl2303.kext osx-pl2303.kext.tgz
Mac-Prompt$ cp -R osx-pl2303.kext /System/Library/Extensions/
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext: Permission denied
cp: osx-pl2303.kext: unable to copy extended attributes to /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext: Permission denied
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents: No such file or directory
cp: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents: unable to copy extended attributes to /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Info.plist: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS: No such file or directory
cp: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS: unable to copy extended attributes to /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS/osx-pl2303: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources: No such file or directory
cp: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources: unable to copy extended attributes to /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/COPYING: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj: No such file or directory
cp: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj: unable to copy extended attributes to /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj: No such file or directory
cp: /System/Library/Extensions/osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings: No such file or directory
Mac-Prompt$
Use ‘sudo’ in front of each line to execute them with super-user rights.
Martijn
Thanks so much, my serial adapter works perfectly now under Lion!
Hi.
Great work, thanks. I made a little installer for this module to have it done in one step without terminal commands. Check here:
http://changux.co/osx-installer-to-pl2303-serial-usb-on-osx-lio
Thank you!! worked like a charm!
Thanks dude, awesome work!!!
Thanks,
Work for me consoling into Cisco devices using screen.
I get the olowing error in ‘sudo dmesg’.
AppleUSBCDC: start – initDevice failed
You van use System Information (system profiler on OSX < 10.7) to check if the adapter is a pl2303 based adapter.
Based on the error I guess that it isn’t.
It is, it worked fine in 10.5 with the drivers from the manufacture. This specific one happens to be the one from BestBuy.
USB-Serial Controller:
Product ID: 0×2303
Vendor ID: 0x067b (Prolific Technology, Inc.)
Version: 3.00
Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
Manufacturer: Prolific Technology Inc.
Location ID: 0×04100000 / 4
Current Available (mA): 500
Current Required (mA): 100
Thanks so many times!
Can’t believe that the current official kext, that “supports lion” does not work! Come on Prolific, release a working driver for your product!
and i get the same message in dmesg!
0 0 AppleUSBCDC: start – initDevice failed
on lion 10.7.2
from system information:
Produkt-ID: 0×2303
Hersteller-ID: 0x067b (Prolific Technology, Inc.)
the device is called /dev/tty.PL2303-000013FA btw..
Hi Martijn,
Thank you _very_ much for this Kernel Extension. I was just getting ready setting up my Cisco voice lab when I realized I upgrade to Lion last week…
You saved the day, thanks.
Regards,
Bas
Rich Love at MacWise pointed me your way and it worked great. Thank you.
This driver seems to overrun the output buffer. When data is written faster than the serial port can output it, data loss or corruption happens when some buffer fills up. If the buffer isn’t allowed to fill up, everything works perfectly. The write calls in C never fail, and they always return as if they wrote the requested number of bytes. I’m using a Dynex DX-UBDB9 adapter with 10.7.2 and communicating at 9600 baud without any flow control.
The 1.4.0 driver from Prolific doesn’t have this problem. It did cause hangs which made the process using it unkillable and prevented the driver from being unloaded. However, after making some changes to termios flags I’m not getting that problem anymore.
Thanks!, I’m transitioning from PC to an MBP and this was the deal breaker.
Thank you very much! I was trying around for days with the PL2303 driver and had no luck, this one worked on the first try!
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Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!
I finally got comms going over a prolific based RS485 interface. (the driver from prolific.com.tw got me nowhere.)
Mixed blessing though. After just a few transactions, my Lion machine kernel panicked with USB IO kit driver in the backtrace.
If it is of help, I can send you the dump.
Got a new iMac a couple of months ago, and have been using Lightroom mostly. Recently, I had to use Photoshop to do some extracting of backgrounds around people and hair in particular. A bit cumbersome with just the mouse.
Remembered that I got a Wacom Digitizer II. Got a Sandberg serial to USB adaptor today, and started to get a little bit frustrated when I found Tablet Magic and the device could not be found.
Luckily I did some more searching and came by your tip. Too good to be true, I thought.
BUT, it worked!!!!!!!! Extraction will now be a whole lot easier!!!!
Thanks a million.
One happy Norwegian
Thanks very much! I’ll echo some of the others that I needed to sudo some of the commands. Also, if you don’t wanna download a real terminal emulator, `screen` will talk to a tty quite happily.
e.g. ` screen /dev/tty.PL2303-00002006 19200 ` works on my machine. The digits after PL2303 will probably vary for you, and the 19200 is the baud rate — some devices only like to go to 9600 baud.
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Thank a lot !
I have tried the method mentioned…I am currently able to see the device in /dev/tty.usbserial …But when I tried to open the zTerm and config with 9600,8bit,null,1 with no flow control…I can only see a underline and there is nothing inside the window…even I tape in anything it doesn’t show in the xterm windows..
I am very confusing about this..I just wanna to use MAC to configure my routers..
Btw I am using the new MACBK Pro.I am not sure if that causes the problem.
I experienced a problem when I ungraded to OS X 10.7 that didn’t allow my Bushnell Neo golf GPS to connect to my computer. This website has allowed me to reconnect. Thanks very much.
a Long time i’ve been searching for a solution that work… and this one is the one that did the trick!
10x a lot
After restarting this worked perfectly. Thank you.
Mac OS X Version 10.7.2
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Many thanks!!
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You rock! Worked perfectly!
freaking awesome! this even let my cheap little radio shack usb-to-serial adapter work under OSX! Thanks!
Here is the Official Driver for the UC-232A latest version as of today..
Tested and works fine under 10.7.2 lion
http://www.fileserve.com/file/CFptqB9/UC-232AC_1.4.0.zip
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=IVDIPRO2
I love you Tobias!
After 2 days of wasted install/unistall of any kind of 2303 drivers I’ve solved with CoolTerm. A lot of problems with ZTerm and MacWise.
Thanks, thanks, thanks and thanks again!
I have used this on OSX Lion 10.7.2 (11C74) on a macbook pro 15″ 2.66 GHz i7 pre-thunderbolt.
But on Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2 (11C2002) on a macbook pro 15″ 2.5 GHz i7 thunderbolt model, this driver will cause the Mac to hang at bootime.
A verbose boot reveals little, as do the logs.
I’ve tried the download from Prolific which claims to work for Lion (this failed to work on the older mac, as well) and the download from “ATEN” on this page.
I can recover by restoring /System and /Library.
Can you share your build info, so I can have a crack at rolling my own?
Worked like a charm, thank you!
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I thought my Lion upgrade had made me a very unhappy person.
The company supplied 1.4 (that masquerade as 1.3) drivers failed repeatedly.
Yours work like a charm.
Virtual high-five – and there’s a beer in Toronto with your name on it if you ever are on this side of the “pond”.
73 de VA3NMI
Wow…I connected up my ETX yesterday for the first time with Lion and I have spent all of today trying to get it working! I was getting nowhere until I found your page here and now my scope is connected and working fine on my MBA.
Thanks a million times over….or maybe I should say, Thanks*10^6
Rich
Hey collega!
Vette shit man, het werkt!
Groeten, josa
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David,
Have you had any luck on a thunderbolt i7 macbook pro running 10.7.2? I can’t seem to get anything at all to work. Thanks.
I don’t have the hardware to test this. However, you can try to build the driver yourself. You can download the Xcode project from the URL below.
Maybe just a ‘build’ on you i7 will suffice.
https://github.com/mpepping/osx-pl2303
Good luck!
I followed the directions step by step, it works like a champ. Cheers!
Thanks, great work!!
I tried a lot of driver and have asked the Apple Support. Finally, you have the solution for me.
Thanks bud!!!
Nice work man.
Very nice to have my adapter working again so quickly since upgrading my work laptop to Lion. Thanks much!
Martijn – thanks so much for doing this work. It really helped me out with my adapter and Lion.
E
Brilliant! Saved my day!
Hi,
I’ve followed your steps, and now i am able to select the cable in applications such as ZTerm and CoolTerm. But when i connect to the cisco router, i don’t see anything popping up. I’m using the correct configuration (9600, 8 data bits, no parity and stop bits 1).
Do you have an idea of what the problem might be?
Thank you.
Jelle
Great stuff, Thanks Martijn!
Worth remembering to do
hm, i meant do sudo -i
Tried to follow your instructions. Installation worked, when I load the driver it also seems to work:
desmond:Extensions root# kextstat | grep 2303
>> 135 0 0xffffff7f80f5f000 0xb000 0xb000 nl.bjaelectronics.driver.PL2303 (1.0.0d1)
When I’m looking for a new tty device, after I’ve plugged in the USB2SER cable, I do not see anything new, most of the times:
mb@desmond ~ [0] [94] $ ll /dev/tty.*
> crw-rw-rw- 1 root wheel 18, 2 27 Feb 19:55 /dev/tty.Bluetooth-Modem
> crw-rw-rw- 1 root wheel 18, 0 27 Feb 20:02 /dev/tty.Bluetooth-PDA-Sync
Sometimes there are new devices:
> me@myhost ~ [0] [95] $ ll /dev/ttys00*
> crw–w—- 1 me tty 16, 0 27 Feb 20:32 /dev/ttys000
> crw–w—- 1 me tty 16, 1 27 Feb 20:33 /dev/ttys001
After I try to connect to such a device, I’m not able to connect a second time. Instead I get:
> me@myhost ~ [0] [96] $ screen /dev/ttys001
>Cannot open your terminal ‘/dev/ttys001′ – please check.
When I try to do a “# kextstat | grep 2303″ again, there is no kex anymore.
OSX 10.7.3
I’m pretty sure that my Cable uses the 2303 chip. At least the name on the cable says HL-340.
Any Ideas?
Hey Markus
I am having the same issue. Did you ever get this sorted?
I seem to get this in my system information:
USB2.0-Ser!:
Product ID: 0×7523
Vendor ID: 0x1a86
Version: 2.54
Speed: Up to 12 Mb/sec
Location ID: 0xfd130000 / 5
Current Available (mA): 500
Current Required (mA): Unknown (Device has not been configured)
GREAT, THANKS!!!
Excellent, works with this http://linitx.com/product/11627 on my 2011 MBP – thank you for sorting this out! Driver on prolific site didn’t work at all, this one works with no issues.
Worked like a charm. No issue. Quick and easy. Thanks.
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You da man! Nice work.
Geweldig! Na eerst de orginele 1.40 driver geïnstalleerd te hebben (en weer met veel moeite, inclusief een reboot, gedeinstalleerd te hebben) doet jouw driver het op OSX Lion het gewoon in 1 keer! Super
Hello! I need some help regarding pl2303. I really don’t have any idea of what the pl2303 is, but often when I update software, it appears a window that says something like this: Systemtillegg kext.pl2303 cannot be used because it is installed incorrectly.
It’s been like this since I installed Parallels desktop & windows 7 couple of yrs back. Maybe I then tried to install this pl2303. Can’t remember.
What does it mean;how does it affect my computer, and how do I fix this..??!?!! Please help.
NMK
Awesome…thank you. I use this to control a telescope from my laptop. Works perfect. Passing your site on to others. Thanks again!
Help.
I don’t understand any of the operations needed….
Could someone guide me ?
Thx.
Thank you so much! great work!
This works fine with one USB/serial device connected. But… it doesn’t work fine when I have two different serial devices connected.
When I run my application using only one device, it runs fine for weeks on end. But when two (dissimilar) devices are connected, the system soon goes totally CPU-bound (“red” system cpu, in Activity Monitor), and the system hangs.
My question: Is the 1.4.0 Prolific driver multithreaded? It acts like it is not…
Life-saver…
Thanks!
Merci!!!!!!!
Thanks a bunch for compiling this my friend
Now I can run around the racks with my macbook air and connect to consoles.
God Bless ya all
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Thanks for the instructions for RS232
PL2303 Serial-USB on OSX Lion
I have the next file and moved it to /System/Library/Extensions
chmod -R 755 osx-pl2303.kext seemed to work, but next command failed
I verified permissions are read and write
Can you advise ??
paul-fosters-MacBook-Pro:Extensions Paul$ chown -R root:wheel osx-pl2303.kext
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Info.plist: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS/osx-pl2303: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/MacOS: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/COPYING: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources/English.lproj: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents/Resources: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext/Contents: Operation not permitted
chown: osx-pl2303.kext: Operation not permitted
paul-fosters-MacBook-Pro:Extensions Paul$
Scratch my previous quert re permissions. I re-read comments and found the SUDO advice. That worked.
Thank you for this technical info —-
Paul
Sry mate, the comment was too long, just wonder was there any fully compile driver in github ready, as per my reading it still no recommendation.
Please help here.
Driver on prolific site didn’t work at all, this one works with no issues. Thanks for getting me going!
One more thank you! We use these adapters at work all the time and I’m pointing people at these instructions frequently. Thanks.
Hi, man…
just wanted to leave you a note saying how happy I am that I found this page
Thank you! You’re the hero of the internets
I want to thank you for this driver. As a note to others installing on a clean system (not upgraded from SL), OSX lion and using ZOC 6.35. For me this driver did not work initially. I had to first install the Prolific driver, which can be found at:
http://www.prolific.com.tw/support/files//IO%20Cable/PL-2303/Drivers%20-%20Generic/MacOS/MacOS%2010.x/md_PL2303_MacOSX10.6_dmg_v1.4.0.zip
Reboot, after this the kernel registered the device as tty.usbserial. Then installing this driver the other device ‘cu.PL2303-00002006 ‘ (the #s after – is the device ID) appeared.
Good luck.
Thanks a lot… I save so much time, cause if your small advice