MY BU Puck won't work

[karmak]

I have a BU puck type USB GPS receiver. I plug it in and I know it works because the software that came with it tells me what port and baud rate it's set to (COM5, 4800), and it can get the satellites, etc. It also appears as COM port #5 in task manager (windows 7).

But, when I open the Navigator 2012 and open the GPS dialog, only ports 0, 2 and 3 are available. Post #5 is not there.

How can I make the program see port COM5?

[Garytf]

If I remember correctly from my TLDCN2010 and TLDCN2011 (still waiting for TRN2012), the port usually doesn't appear in the program if it's being used by another program. I guess that's a limitation of Windows, that only one program can be using a certain port at any time.

So, is some other program using the port?

[karmak]

There is no other program running that would be using the COM port.

[xavier]

Have you tried rebooting your system? I know it sounds silly, but sometimes, these virtual ports and or the drivers get into a suspended state and there is no way to get them pout of it. Shutting down and restarting your computer sometimes re-initializes everything. It could be that's all you need.

[karmak]

Thanks, Xavier. I rebooted many times, but that didn't seem to solve the problem. However, I found the culprit. When I connect the GPS, the first thing I do is run the software that came with it to see if it's working properly. However, I never exited the software, I just minimized it and I guess that's the "other" ^%#$@&% program that was using the COM port and was not available for the Navigator.

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions.