[Noisebridge-discuss] Do we have a USB to Parallel (printer) port converter?

Jake jake at spaz.org
Wed Jun 27 22:17:11 UTC 2012


Jonathan, please not the "why can't we have nice things" talk again!

Yes, me and Jesse backed up the machine, Hao blew the dust out of it 
recently, Alan has worked on it, I put a new monitor on it, Miloh bought a 
bag of collets for it.  It's fine and in great condition.  And there's a 
fine dust cover on it, PLUS the machine itself is wrapped in cellophane.

and don't say the machine was stolen unless you know for sure that the 
person who took it KNEW it wasn't up for grabs, or that it somehow wound 
up in a hack bin, who knows what happened to it.  If you need another 
laptop for something, just ask on the list and several people will offer 
you one out of their personal hoard stash.

Hao, it's true that you can't run that CNC machine without a proper 
parallel port.  I don't see why that's a problem, because there are plenty 
of fancy desktop computers lying around with parallel ports on them.
Why would you want to use a laptop with that machine, with bits of sawdust 
and metal shavings flying around everywhere?

-jake

Jonathan Foote:
There was a  T40 thinkpad with a parallel port that I used as a backup
for the CNC machine, but it was stolen. :(

On that note, someone has backed up the configuration files for the
MAXCNC right? If that machine bites it (not unlikely because someone
trashed the dust cover) all that (nontrivial) work on those files is
lost and the CNC will return to its former status as a boat anchor.



On Tue, Jun 26, 2012 at 9:12 PM, Martin Bogomolni <martinbogo at 
gmail.com> wrote:
> You -cannot- run any CNC machines with a USB->Parallel converter.
>
> You will never get the low latency you need, the timing, to make it 
work.
>
> I guarantee it.
>
> If you don't have a PC with a serial port, buy a real PCI (or PCIe)
> Parallel port card.
>
> -M





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