Protection Devices

[David Millen]

I am about to have two printing devices. One is an Epson Color Stylus 1520 printer and the other is a HP-DesignJet 220 plotter. We have attempted to use a Belkin Biodirectional smart switch with our C&G protection device connected at the CPU. The switch works, but when we return to Intellicad an alarm sounds and/or the program fatal error occurs. I spoke with Belkin support and they suggested that it might be the protection device causing the problem. What do you think?

What if we added a new parrallel port to our computer instead of using the Belkin switch? My question here is---Will we experience a problem with our protection device existing on a single parrallel port and utilizing both devices?

Equipment: Gateway 2000 G6-300xl
Windows 95
Intellicad with C&G for windows version 5.50
EEE1284 biodirectional cables as required
Belkin Bitronics autoswitch model F1U125

Thanks,
Davi

[Floyd Carrington]

David,

My C&G seat at home has the same machine, same C&G ver., same Belkin switch but running Windows 98. I put a second parallel port in the machine for the software lock. Everything works fine.

Floy

[David Millen]

Thanks Floyd. Tell me more about the specific setup. Do you still have a Belkin switch you are utilizing? It sounds as though you have a separate parallel port that only has your protection device attached. Is this the case? What printing/plotting devices do you have?
Davi

[Gary Cottrell]

We have four computers tied to a design jet, a deskjet and a dot-matrix printer using the Belkan auto-switches to merge cables from pairs of computers and to remerge cables to single feeds into the various printers. Switching between output devices is accomplished by a three position manual switchbox --one for each computer pair. Each computer pair consists of a DOS machine running C&G for DOS and and a Windows 2000 machine running either C&G for Windows 5.50 or C&G for AutoCAD with ACAD 2002. We have only one parallel port for each computer with the Sentinel lock the first in line, except on the DOS machines where the lock follows a Zip drive. The Windows 2000 computers have internal Zip drives, because there is a conflict between the Win2K OS, parallel port Zips and Sentinel blocks. The only problem we've experienced is the occasional user memory lapse to switch to the desired output device before hitting the print key

[Floyd Carrington]

Dave,

Yes, I put in a second parallel port just for the protection devive. I'm using the Belkin switch for two computers using two printers (one laser and one ink jet). Be careful of Zip Drives and protection devices. Zip Drives screw up the memory of the protection devices.

Floyd<p

[Barry Bacon, PLS]

Other options:
1-If you only have one computer with one parallel
port, but need to hook two parallel devices to it,
consider using a USB to parallel conversion cable.
It will allow you to hook your printer up to an
unused USB port, while your plotter can use your
parallel port. Aside from a little driver to
install, your computer won't know the difference.

2-If you have multiple computers hooked to a few
plotting/printing devices with switch boxes that
must be set for each computer, consider a peer to
peer network. Microsoft operating systems come
with all the software you need. A 10/100 network
card costs about $20, and hubs are priced by size.
If you have two computers, forless than $100 you
could set up a small network with the plotter on
one PC, the printer on the other. These devices,
in addition to hard drives, zip drives, etc.,
could be shared with the other network printers.

The word 'network' scares most surveyors, but take
it from me - it is VERY easy to set up. Once you
have converted over, you'll wonder why you didn't
do it sooner. Networks are great for backing up
too!<p

[Jeff]

I agree with Barry here, after having networked my own office I could not even imagine doing it the old way with zips floppys etc. to trnasfer files. We set up a decent tower (750mhz 512mb ram)
as the server which connects the other two and does printing plotting faxing and scanning remotly through the work station, plus everyone can get on the internet at the same time