Problem reconnecting printer to a new PC

gaillimhabu

I got a new Dell PC a few weeks ago. It uses usb ports so had to get a new cable for my printer as it is serial port based.
I got the cable which is usb on one side which connects to the pc and usb/serial on the other side for connection to the printer.
The PC picked up the new hardware ok but didnt install it successfully. I will have to recheck what the exact error was as i've forgotton it.

There was a driver disk that came with the new cable which suggested i needed to install a driver. In the instructions it said that a window would pop up and all i had to do was install the driver. This never happened. The disk seems to have 4 folders but none of them includes anything that is installable.

I tried adding a printer too but it said not to use this option for a usb based printer as it would pick it up automatically.

Did anyone have similiar problems? I'll try get more information but won't have access to the PC/printer for another few days.

marcphisto

What's your dell and what's your printer?

Tom Dunne

By the sounds of it, two things need to happen and in this order.

1 - you need to install the disk that came with the cable first. It will probably install a new serial port onto your computer.

2 - you then need to install the driver for the printer itself. It should go looking for the printer on the new serial port, the one you just installed.

Insert the disk for the cable into the computer and browse for a setup.exe. That should do the trick.

stanley1

or you could buy a pci usb card, just plug in your printer and windows "add new hardware" interface will pop up, just load drivers from cd.

Tom Dunne

stanley1 wrote:

or you could buy a pci usb card, just plug in your printer and windows "add new hardware" interface will pop up, just load drivers from cd.

gaillimhabu wrote:

had to get a new cable for my printer as it is serial port based.

He already has USB ports, it's serial ports he is missing.

gaillimhabu

marcphisto wrote:

What's your dell and what's your printer?

Sorry for the delayed reply. Just the PC is at my parents house.

The desktop is a Dell Dimension 3100

Printer is an Epson Stylus c64 photo edition

gaillimhabu

tom dunne wrote:

By the sounds of it, two things need to happen and in this order.

1 - you need to install the disk that came with the cable first. It will probably install a new serial port onto your computer.

2 - you then need to install the driver for the printer itself. It should go looking for the printer on the new serial port, the one you just installed.

Insert the disk for the cable into the computer and browse for a setup.exe. That should do the trick.

I'll give this option a go tom. Thanks

daywalker

if its a c64 are you sure if it uses serial port, that printer is fairly recent so therefore if it has anything besides usb it would be a standard paralell port and not serial?

gaillimhabu

Just got around to this tonight so here is the latest.
The printer has a parallel port instead of serial.
Sorry about the confusion.

I messed about with the cd but didn't seem to have any luck. So just decided to add the printer instead of it trying to pick it up automatically.

When it asked me for the port to use, I went for USB001 instead of the normal Printer port of LPT1. It's description was "Virtual printer port for USB".

I then tried a Test page. Printer started up and proceeded to use all the paper i had without writing anything on it.

I tried a few things after this like "Nozzle Check" which printed a colored pattern but it was only on the top left of the page. Then tried head cleaning but didnt seem to change anything,

I tried to print a page from notepad with some writing. Blank page was printed

It doesnt look like an ink issue as it printed a pattern when i did the Nozzle Check.

Any suggestions folks?

gaillimhabu

Got this working finally.

I happened to come upon the box that the printer came in. The cd was in it.
Threw it in and it installed the printer ok. Prints fine now.

All the work beforehand wasn't needed at all. Thanks guys/gals for all your relpies