Quote Originally Posted by EddyCurrent View Post
The laptop would be okay as long as you went with a USB breakout board,
Careful here because that's not strictly true You need to define USB breakout board.? Or point him to exact component you referring too because Some breakout boards use USB to power them but they still use the Parallel port and this could be misleading to someone new.!

What's needed is a motion control card or board, these can be connected in various ways depending on boards USB and ETHERNET are the main ways.