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More information about the FT232 and other USB chips
 

Other FTDI data

FTDI makes some other things that might be useful
  • The FT245 chipset allows you to stream parallel data, and they apparently provide a DLL for easy driver-writing. Never played with them.
  • RS-232 to FT232 converters, you can buy them from Saelig.
 
Other Chips
I wasn't able to use these chips for various reasons, but they may satisfy a different project.
  • CP2101 This USB/UART chip from Silicon Labs is quite cool, and even has a built in oscillator. Unfortunatly, its 10-mil pitch MLP package made it hazardous to use--much to small for anybody to solder without a reflow oven.
  • TUSB3410 This chip from TI requires a firmware download, or an extra EEPROM with software. After a bit of struggle getting the firmware to load from a Win2K box, I decided it wasn't worth it, especially since it was unlikely it would be easily supported by other OS's. If you need more intelligence from your adaptor chip, and you're willing to write the code, this might be right for you
 
Other Boards
There are a bunch of different DIP boards for interfacing with FT232's & FT245
Most all the boards are listed on FTDI's evalboard page. Some even have PIC microcontrollers with bootloaders already on them. A clever idea...