IR Receiver and High Powered Transmitter for use with LIRC / WinLIRC via its serial driver. Not much technical detail as device has no 'brain' or firmware,etc. Schematic and Layout available to those interested.
No. It will not. Our serial device does not talk RS232, as required by USB→Serial adapters, and doesn't even use the Transmit (TX) and Receive (RX) pins, but the DCD and DTR lines. Why? That's the standard for the LIRC serial devices (see Serial Port Transmitters and Serial Port Receivers if you really want all the details).