1. Does COM1 appear in Measurement & Exploration (MAX) under ports? If not, then there is a configuration error somewhere.
2. Not sure under other OSs (which one are you using?), but in Windows, make sure all the serial config parameters under Windows Device Settings match what you want to do (baud, stop, etc.) and set it to hardware control.
3. Why do you have 2 Set Buffers in a row?
4. If you are new at serial programming, you may want to start w/ the higher level vis, like the simple Serial Config or use search for examples and look up serial for some canned vis.
2006 Ultimate LabVIEW G-eek.