Old PC`s and Mach3

[Leadhead]

I have been building my desktop router and have been screaming with frustration trying to get my steppers to run smoothly. I have three XP PC boxes all working and cleaned of trash proggrammes. All three give ragged pulses to my steppers? A chance conversation with Angeltec revealed that around 50% of his old XP PC`s will not run Mach3 successfully? Following that I tried my system with a PC already running my old Mach3 router and "bobs your uncle" every thing worked perfectly?

So is this a common problem?? If so are these other three PC`s able to be adapted in some way.

[magicniner]

I've been using HP Compaq ex-business desktops and all the models I've tried have good parallel ports for BOB/Mach3 control, right up to the point where the PP was discontinued.
For later models I'm now faced with testing PP cards to find one which is compatible, if you can disable the onboard PP and can find a compatible card then that ought to get you going,
Regards,
Nick

[Leadhead]

I've been using HP Compaq ex-business desktops and all the models I've tried have good parallel ports for BOB/Mach3 control, right up to the point where the PP was discontinued.
For later models I'm now faced with testing PP cards to find one which is compatible, if you can disable the onboard PP and can find a compatible card then that ought to get you going,
Regards,
Nick

[Leadhead]

Nick - Thanks I also have two redundant HP Compaq`s and they are two of the three that will not play ball.
Had a brand new PP card here. Just tried it but "of course" it does not fit in the bus slot.
Will persevere!!!

[cropwell]

Unfortunately the parallel port is an outmoded feature and it was very much adapted to cope with the two way conversation required by external devices such as data backup boxes etc... Mach3 jumped on the bandwagon and all was fine to begin with, but the PP was already sick and dying for printing purposes and USB, Ethernet and Wifi were taking over. My recommendation is to go forward to Ethernet or sideways to USB.

PP at first used TTL logic levels and 5v with low data rates meant most 'printing' didn't come out garbled, but with CMOS and longer cables your chances diminish and Mach3 may squirt out the right pulses, but your BoB won't get enough to process properly and reliably.

Keep your printer cables as short as possible - it won't do any harm.

Cheers

Rob

[Neale]

I bought a one of these a year or so back as I had to replace a motherboard (as it happens, in an old HP PC) and cheap motherboards don't have parallel ports. I'm using LinuxCNC at the moment so wanted to avoid the external motion controller route as there isn't much choice anyway. This PCI card has been working fine under Linux with a cheap BOB on the end of the parallel cable, but I can't speak for Mach3 use. I have built the PC as dual-boot and have Mach3 demo on the Windows half - I really should test it!

[Steel]

I have been building my desktop router and have been screaming with frustration trying to get my steppers to run smoothly. I have three XP PC boxes all working and cleaned of trash proggrammes. All three give ragged pulses to my steppers? A chance conversation with Angeltec revealed that around 50% of his old XP PC`s will not run Mach3 successfully? Following that I tried my system with a PC already running my old Mach3 router and "bobs your uncle" every thing worked perfectly?

So is this a common problem?? If so are these other three PC`s able to be adapted in some way.

I have a ibm t42 laptop running xp and i use a paralell port to the driver board. I use a cpu program called rightmark CPU clock utility, without it i get judder on the steppers with it i get smooth running, its a free utility google it

[magicniner]

I have a ibm t42 laptop running xp and i use a paralell port to the driver board. I use a cpu program called rightmark CPU clock utility, without it i get judder on the steppers with it i get smooth running, its a free utility google it

That utility effectively over rides the laptop power management's propensity to slow down the CPU whenever possible to reduce power consumption, another common laptop problem is a parallel port voltage which proves marginal for driving external logic.
You have a laptop which can work with Mach3 through the parallel port, many will not and that's the reason laptops were not recommended or supported.