hey guys , i think that the problem is in the wrong connection of Max232.
Coming to think about it, I once had a case where one 232 wire was wired to the adjecent pin ON A db9 and the first few character actually got transferred. Fortunately, the terminal was far from the unit so, for test, I moved it to the unit and all worked. I would never have guessed that the above miswire would show that 'partial functionality'

Erik