instrument not recognizing retroprinter is connected

[Bens]

Hello,

Relative newbie trying to get the retroprinter working.

The problem seems to be that the instrument is looking for some sort of feedback or indication that the printer is ready or is connected. The instruments notes that the "printer is not ready" even when the retroprinter is powered up. I tried messing with the handshake settings but none of those seem to have an effect. I tried adjusting the jumpers on the retro printer as well.

Any ideas on what feedback it maybe looking for and how to emulate it with the retroprinter?

Some info that may or may not be relevant:

Printer it is replacing: Okidata microline 320 9pin. Manual states it can emulate Epson FX(ESC/P), IBM Proprinter III (PPSII), and Oki Data Microline Standard Co-resident.

Instrument: Perkin Elmer 2400 CHNS/O Series II elemental Analyzer.

Looking at the male parallel port cable coming from the instrument, it only has 8 pins: 1, 2, 3, 5,6,7,8, and 20.

Retroprinter setup: I used the default directory for the data. Tried setting emulation to Epson, IBM, and TXT. I have a Centronics to parallel port converter on it. So instrument -> prallel port cable -> parallel port convert to Centronics -> retroprinter.

Thank you in advance for any help!

[RWAP]

The Retro-Printer not being recognised is more related to the printer drivers on the host device - most devices of this era do not have dedicated printer drivers and work with any connected printer; but those which use a version of Windows for example, may send a query to the device and expect a response to confirm it is connected, has paper and is not busy (for example).

The details of those software based protocols are simply not available anywhere.

In your instance, I think the clue is that you talk about "the male parallel port cable coming from the instrument" - is the connector on the back of the instrument actually a male 25 pin serial port socket rather than a female 25 pin centronics port socket?
https://www.unm.edu/~tbeach/terms/image ... rtsBIG.jpg

There are not enough pins connected for it to be a centronics port connector (as that requires at 8 pins for the data alone).

We CAN support serial port input but that is experimental at the moment - so contact us via retroprinter.com with details and we can explain how to set this up.

Rich

[Bens]

Hello Rich,

It is indeed a 25 pin serial (parallel) port, male directly on the instrument.

I'll send an email.

Thanks!

Ben