Hi guys (and gals)

I am generally not a very technical programmer so feel like I am beating my head against a wall, I hope that you can shed some light...

My problem is that I am trying to pop open a cash drawer wich is connected to my machine via COM3 (my modem port) Now it seems quite a simple task you send a character or two to the port/drawer and it pops open.

I am trying to do this via vb.net at the moment (but have tried hyperterminal and dos to test unsuccesfully) I think Ive got the connection to the com port as a little icon pops up in my taskbar displaying to that affect but doesnt show any bytes moving around. So I think that my problem lies in writing to the port correctly?

here is an example of VB6 code they suggest you can use...

Code:
Dim IntFreeFile As Integer
'Set IntFreeFile to the next available file number
IntFreeFile = FreeFile

'Open the parallel port with #IntFreeFile
Open "LPT1" For Output As #IntFreeFile
'Print to the parallel port, This is the line that fires the drawer.
Print #IntFreeFile, Chr$(27) + "p" + "0"
'Close the port
Close IntFreeFile
Here is the code that I am trying to write to the port with in .Net

Code:
        Dim dt(255) As Byte
        Dim written As Integer

        Dim AE As New ASCIIEncoding
        Dim count As Integer = 0

'-- Was using all these characters to test...
        For count = 0 To 255
            dt(count) = AE.GetBytes(Chr(count))(0)
        Next

        'Check if our comport is open
        If Opened = True Then
            WriteFile(hPort, dt, 256, written, Nothing)

       '-- Etc..
Has anyone done anything similar? Any advice? even maybe how to do this via Hyperterminal or something...(im getting desperate!) :P