Thanks a ton, RB. I did notice that schmidt trigger inputs were indeed differently spec'ed than TTL'd ones but didn't know where to search to know what type the input was. Hadn't thought about looking at the internal workings diagram (always been a software guy and that part rarely helped, except for looking at muxes along the way of a signal).
Bill, i have already suggested the FT232 (has a very wide operation voltage). He wanted to stick with the CP2101 because he made many projects with it and is familiar with the PC side aspects (drivers, etc).
Thanks again!