🚀 go-pugleaf

paul@intra.demon.co.uk (Paul) wrote:

>I have a Mannesmann Tally MT150 24pin dot matrix serial printer
>connected to com2 on a 486 DX2 66 with 4 MB Ram (dos 6.22 and WFWG
>3.11).
>Originally I could not get the printer to print in dos or windows. I
>have now got the printer to operate in windows by changing the port
>settings on com2 from 19200 baud and hardware handshaking (internet
>settings) to 9600 baud and xon/xoff handshaking.
>Does 2 to 3 minutes to print out a fax header seem about right for a dot
>matrix. The printer originally ran on an Olivetti M28 under Xenix and
>seemed much faster, printing plain text mail shots, but I guess this is
>due to Xenix's better coms handling than windows.

>My real problem is printing to com2 in dos.
>I have been using the Mode command  to redirect output from lpt1 to com2
>but without success. Having read and re-read the dos help files for Mode
>and Print, I have been issuing the following commands:

>Mode com2 9600,n,8.1
This was a typo, should be mode com2 9600,n,8,1
>Mode lpt1=com2

>Print /d:com2 config.sys

>Dos reports that config.sys is printing but there is no output from the
>printer. If I type print again dos reports the printer may be off-line.
>A friend of mine gave me a small program (which he wrote) which sends
>plain text files to the serial port of your choice. This works fine and
>the speed is excellent. However you need to re run the program for each
>file you print and it can't be incorporated into dos programs such as
>Sage Accounting etc.
>Any ideas how to use Mode to redirect the print output ?

I have a 2 way data transfer switch attached to com2 (modem on one and
printer on the other).
With the switch set to my external modem, if I use copy file com2,  the
file is sent to the modem (i.e. the lights flash) but with the switch
set to printer I get an error message of "unable to write to device,
abort, retry, ignore, fail ?"

All my diagnostics sotware confirms com2 is fully operational. The
serial cable I am using was originally used on a Xenix system, maybe
this is the problem. Perhaps the pin settings are slightly different
with Xenix, although the printer works ok in windoze. 

Paul


ANON