cwc@mhuxd.UUCP (Chip Christ) (03/31/84)
- How's this for a grabber? I recently purchased one of these things because the buffered printer port seemed to provide the finishing touch to my son's system without going overboard. As I told the guy in the store (who pointed out that there were bigger and better ways of expanding an Atari 800 system), if I want a serious system, I'll go out and buy one. Well, folks, I just proved once again that there's one born every minute. The disk drive works fine. The only problem here is that the literature (and the dealer, possibly mistakenly) implies that the "Turbo software", which comes with the drive, is a DOS. WRONG!! You still need Atari DOS to boot the thing. Disappointing, but not too big a deal. Here's the real kick in the teeth. The dealer tries to sell me a printer cable. Now, I have a real antique of an MPI 88T printer in which both the parallel and serial inputs are terminated in headers on the pc board. I'll make my own, thank you, sez I, knowing that no way will the standard cable work. HA! Nowhere in the documentation does it give the pinouts for the 34-pin edge card connector. Naturally, I call Trak (on their toll-free number, of course). First, the gal on the other end tries to get me to call their tech staff long distance. No sale. Then another gal, presumably in charge, gets on the phone to listen to my problem-- "that's better, I think to myself". Not on your life! Upon hearing my request, she informs me that they do not give out the pinouts for the printer port. If I have some other kind of connector than that which matches their cable (36-pin Centronics), I could see my dealer, who can evaluate my request, contact Trak, and maybe, just maybe, they can assemble a custom cable for me. And we all can imagine what that will cost. Moral of this sad tale: With an attitude like that (as if parallel printer connections were some big proprietary deal), I wonder how accommodating they would be if I had a really big technical problem. Caveat Emptor, prospective buyers. Sadder, but maybe wiser, Chip p.s. Unless someone out there has already solved this problem, and can mail me the pinouts, I'm going to be forced to buy their cable, map the pinouts to the 36-pin connector, and then return it because, surprise, it won't fit. Unfortunately, the only one who will be inconvenienced (besides me) is the dealer. Maybe I'll give him a copy of the pinout map so he can get into the custom cable business himself!
rbk@akguc.UUCP (r.b. kummer ) (04/05/84)
The 34-pin edge card connector on the TRAK AT-D2 disk drive is pin-to-pin compatible with the first 34 pins of a standard 36-pin Centronics parallel interface (as is used on Epson and most other printers) so that ribbon connectors can be used on both ends. I don't have the Centronics pin assignments readily at hand, but I can supply them if you can't find them. Some of the early drives (before ~ Jan) also had problems with: a) garbled graphics output b) drive motor sometimes refuses to shut off c) won't format the 'flip' side of a disk Problem a) can be fixed with a new ROM which TRAK will supply free of charge. Problems b) and c) require some added jumpers and trace cutting. These problems have all been fixed in the current models, I'm told. Brad Kummer akgua!rbk AT&T Bell Laboratories - Atlanta