What Is FT232R USB UART
The FT232R is a USB to UART chip device designed by FTDI. UART includes RS232, RS449, RS423, RS422, and RS485 interfaces, which are now deprecated by most modern laptops.
If your PCs have those interfaces, you can upgrade them to USB with this chip. If you need to connect devices using these interfaces to PC, you can also use this chip to serve as a USB to UART adapter. But to use the chip, you need to install the FT232R USB UART driver.
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How to Install FT232R USB UART Driver
Actually, FTDI didn’t offer software called FT232R USB UART driver. It just offers VCP (Virtual COM port) drivers that cause the USB device to appear as an additional COM port available to the PC. To some extent, the VCP driver is the FT232R USB UART driver you are finding.
To install the FT232R USB UART driver, here are 2 ways for you:
Way 1. Install the Drive with the Executable File
Step 1: Connect the FT232R USB UART device to your PC.
Step 2: Go to the FTDI VCP driver website and download the setup executable driver. Please note that FTDI only offers the executable version to Windows OS. If possible, download the latest version.
Step 3: Unzip the file. Double-click the executable file to run it. Then, follow the wizard to install the FT232R USB UART driver.
Step 4: After the installation is completed, open Device Manager and expand Ports (COM & LPT). If you see USB Serial Port, it means that the installation is successful. Then, you need to verify whether the device can work properly.
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Way 2. Install the Drive Manually
Step 1: Connect the FT232R USB UART device to your PC.
Step 2: Download a proper FT232R USB UART driver from the FTDI VCP driver website and extract it. But this time, you should download the manual version. Please pay attention to the OS version (32-bit or 64-bit).
Step 3: Open Device Manager and expand Other devices. You will find the FT232R USB UART device with a warning icon. Right-click the device and then select Update Driver Software.
Step 4: Click Browse my computer for driver software. Click Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer. Choose Show All Devices and click Next button.
Step 5: In the next window, click Have Disk button. Click Browse and then locate the ftdiport.inf file in the FT232R USB UART driver file you have downloaded. Then, click Open and OK buttons.
Step 6: In the Model section, choose USB Serial Converter. Click Next and Yes button. Then, a new device named USB Serial Port will appear under Device Manager > Other devices directory. But this device also has a yellow warning icon.
Step 7: Right-click the device and repeat the steps to update driver again. But this time, in the last step, in the Model section, choose USB Serial Port.