I'm running a Windows 98 SE VM on my W7 HP machine. My physical machine does not have an integrated serial port and I need to use one in W98 in order to program some radio equipment. I'm trying to use a USB cable that combines the USB/serial adaptor with the connector to program my equipment. My motherboard does have an onboard serial header for a serial port bracket, but the cable that I need to use is USB. My serial port is disabled in the BIOS.
The adaptor shows up fine in W7, the drivers are there and it shows up correctly in the device manage. I can connect it to the VM by going into the VM settings and assigning the COM port to the serial port in the VM. However, when I try to access my equipment from the COM1 port in W98 through my programming software that runs in a DOS window (hence the need for W98), I get an error saying that there is a overlapping I/O issue and that my serial adaptor will be disconnected. I've tried several fixes such as reassigning the USB/serial adaptor COM port in W7 but that did not change anything. What can I do to not get the error message when I'm trying to access my radio equipment?