Opry99er Posted May 18, 2015 Share Posted May 18, 2015 (edited) ...but... Could this be used with the TI PIO port? http://nashville.craigslist.org/ele/5003646744.html It is supposed to run serial OR parallel inputs---rs232 compliant. I imagine it will NOT work... But I thought I would ask. Edited May 18, 2015 by Opry99er Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyerd Posted May 18, 2015 Share Posted May 18, 2015 (edited) Don't see why not! It emulates an Epsom FX100 and IBM Proprinter III XL as well as others. Edited May 18, 2015 by wyerd Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted May 18, 2015 Share Posted May 18, 2015 Actually, if it will work in an EPSON compatible mode, it should work fine. . .it might require some playing around with the cables to get a fully functional connection, but it should work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 18, 2015 Author Share Posted May 18, 2015 (edited) I wonder how fast it could print via the TI RS232 PIO port... My assumption over the years has been that the printing speed of my Panasonic 1091 was an attribute of the printer, and not the computer... (Well, to a point anyway) This printer can print 500 data.lines.per minute... Wonder how fast the PIO can spit out data? Edited May 18, 2015 by Opry99er Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sparkdrummer Posted May 18, 2015 Share Posted May 18, 2015 Must be a line printer, eh? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 18, 2015 Author Share Posted May 18, 2015 'Tis Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 18, 2015 Author Share Posted May 18, 2015 Spec sheets: http://www.tallyprinteroutlet.com/legacy-line-printers/tally-line-printers-model-t6050-500-lpm/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 18, 2015 Author Share Posted May 18, 2015 Hell, it's cheap if it works properly... Still though... $300 for a printer... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted May 18, 2015 Share Posted May 18, 2015 should work fine, parallel is fast enough.. rs232 you'll be limited to what the ti can pump out prob pause between lines.. i used to use an old anadex line printer that print head moved so fast that guys used to warn us not to lean over it with a tie on or it might snag and best case throw you across the room Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willsy Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 Yes - my first "computer job" back in the mid 80's. We had an old line printer. It had sound deadening gear all around it. It fascinated me. It actually had a machine at the back of the printer to catch the paper and fold it as it was emitted from the printer. Absoloutely ferocious! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Vorticon Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 This thing triggers something visceral in me I want it! But then of course reality hits since it will achieve no more than what my current far smaller Panasonic KXP-1123 printer does... But then, imagine running your hand along those beautiful curves... Aaahhhh... (and put those filthy thoughts away you depraved animals!). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted May 19, 2015 Share Posted May 19, 2015 I just love the sound of a good line printer. I really liked the sound of a Model 40 Teletype printing at 1200 BAUD. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 I just love the sound of a good line printer. Ahhhh, the sound of nostalgia! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEJYNtI2ul4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 20, 2015 Author Share Posted May 20, 2015 Welp... I have to pass. I am just about to spend my TI budget for the year (or two) on something other than this awesome printer... Maybe I could start a Kickstarter fund to finance this purchase. "Need $300 to quench an unquenchable thirst for a parallel line printer!!!" LOL! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 20, 2015 Author Share Posted May 20, 2015 Would it necessarily pause between lines? Would a print buffer (like in the CCTT card) allow it to print faster? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Would it necessarily pause between lines? Would a print buffer (like in the CCTT card) allow it to print faster? Print faster? No, that is a function of the printer. What the Triple Tech Card has is a 64K printer buffer, which allows you to dump a document of 64K or less, that way it frees up the TI for other tasks while the printer is still doing it's thing. It also has a copy button that allowes you to make a copy of what is in the buffer without re-running a program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 20, 2015 Author Share Posted May 20, 2015 (edited) What we are talking about here is a line printer capable of 500 lines of text per minute... The TI is the question mark here... How fast can the PIO spit out text? If we had a print buffer loaded up with the text, would it spool faster to the line printer? Edited May 20, 2015 by Opry99er Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 20, 2015 Author Share Posted May 20, 2015 (edited) Looks like pins 1,10,13 and 14 control communication with the attached printer... Is the printer/computer interface a HANDSHAKING exercise, or is it a dumb data stream? By this, I mean does the HANDSHAKEIN pin require a receipt verification from the printer before it transmits another set of data, or does it just continuously spool bytes until the transmission is complete? If not a HANDSHAKE connection, perhaps pins 13 and 14 are used to just continuously send data? Edited May 20, 2015 by Opry99er Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tursi Posted May 20, 2015 Share Posted May 20, 2015 Although the parallel port 'specification' allows for full handshaking, usually it's only implemented from the printer to the computer, so the printer can hold the computer when its internal buffer is full, or it's offline. 500 lines per minute, if we assumed an average of 60 characters per line, would be about 500 characters per second. It's theoretically doable on the TI - I've never seen how fast any software I have /actually/ prints, I only used BASIC and Editor/Assembler back in the day. (BASIC is BASIC, and E/A prints while it reads from disk, so the disk limits the speed.) I actually had an external print buffer back in the day, too. I actually really liked that device, I could just dump the data and keep working while it printed in the background. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 20, 2015 Author Share Posted May 20, 2015 What if we did a LIST PIO of a large XB or BASIC program... It does a LIST very quickly onto the monitor... I would assume that the output speed would be slightly reduced via the parallel port, but if it is anywhere near the monitor LIST speed, we might be close to the max... I haven't speed tested a LIST before, but it seems like 5-6 lines per second on single line statements is about right. That is somewhere between 300-360 lines per minute. Of course, that is LISTing to the monitor... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed in SoDak Posted June 1, 2015 Share Posted June 1, 2015 It's been awhile, but it seems my old Epson would crank out an 80-character line in about a second in the faster modes. A listing went faster, due to much shorter lines, but paper advance and other things took the same time regardless of line length, so maybe a half-second per line. So that's something like 60-120 lines per minute, and the printer was definitely the bottleneck at that speed, so long as the TI did not need disk access for more data to print. A buffer freed the TI much, much faster than a large file would print, so 300+ lines seems doable with a fast printer. -Ed Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 1, 2015 Share Posted June 1, 2015 (edited) That's a transmission rate of about 8,800 bits/second, so it is still well under 9,600 Baud. (500 lines per minute translates to 8.333 lines/second, multiplied by the number of characters per line (132 for a standard wide-platen printer) for 1100 characters per second, multiplied by the number of bits ( 8 ) to get 8,800 bits per second. Note that calculating in one start and one stop bit increases that to 11,000 bits per second, which would overrun a 9,600 Baud connection. The TI should be able to keep up with that. . .but it may be close, as I've never seen anything on the TI that pushed the Parallel port that hard. You might want to look at the TripleTech manual to see what the data transfer rate to the print buffer is, as that is between the printer and the computer. Edited June 1, 2015 by Ksarul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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