bba@mtgzz.UUCP (XMRJ40000[pjc]-b.banerjee) (03/02/88)
Hi, I have a couple of questions which I'm sure that the knowledgeable readers of this group should have no problems with. Replying to these should have two tangible benefits. a. You increase your karma for the (after|next) life. b. I get to post some cool software that I'm working on sooner. First my setup: I have an A500 with 1 meg, and a single disk drive. I have an NEC P6 printer on the parallel port, and a 1200 bps modem on the serial port. Now the questions. 1. I got a good buy on the P6. It comes with parallel interface, and a cable for the IBM PC. I hooked it up, generated a printer driver with prtdrvgen (Off of the Fish Disks) and decided to try it out. Anyhow, I couldn't print anything out. I pulled out the manuals for both the A500 and the P6. Looking at the interface diagrams, I notice the following differences: Pin Amiga P6 14 +5V Pullup Auto Feed XT 16 Reset No Connection 17 Frame Ground Signal Ground 19-25 Signal Ground Ground 26-30 - Ground 31 - Input Prime 32 - Fault 33 - Signal Ground 36 - Slct In Now, first of all -- did I fry my printer because Pin 14 had power on it? Secondly, how can I modify my cable so that my Amiga speaks to my printer. What's confusing is that there appears to be 3 varieties of ground -- 'Frame', 'Signal' and just plain vanilla ground. I'd appreciate your help with this. The second question is more in the way of requesting advice. 2. I picked up a copy of Manx C 3.6A from the local software vendor. I bought the 'professional' package. Looking through the documentation, it doesn't appear to support function prototypes. Does anyone know if this facility is currently supported, or shall be supported in the not too distant future? Also, since I don't have a 2nd floppy, what is the best way of setting this up so that I can use it for development. Since I have 1 meg, I can put some stuff in ram:. The question is -- what should I put in ram: to ensure the most painless development. Advice here would be greatly appreciated. Regards,
kenchiu@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Kenneth Chiu) (03/03/88)
In article <3689@mtgzz.UUCP> bba@mtgzz.UUCP (XMRJ40000[pjc]-b.banerjee) writes: >Now, first of all -- did I fry my printer because Pin 14 had >power on it? Secondly, how can I modify my cable so that my Amiga >speaks to my printer. What's confusing is that there appears to >be 3 varieties of ground -- 'Frame', 'Signal' and just plain >vanilla ground. I'd appreciate your help with this. I had this same dilemna a while ago. I asked some dealers and other users, and they all said it was "IBM-compatible." But after looking at the pin-outs, I wasn't sure. So I just disconnected the ones that didn't seem to jive exactly, and I checked all the connections, and it works. Note that pin x on the Centronics side does not necessarily go to to pin x on the "IBM-compatible" side. Some hardware type will have to explain all the details, this is just my practical experience. E-mail me if you want details. Ken Chiu