Conference hydra::amiga_v1

    Re .0:
                                                                 
>   I have a problem with transferring my Star NX-10C printer from my ol'
>   C64 to the brand new for Christmas Amiga 500.
>   
>   My fault probably for not thinking far enough ahead, but when I bought
>   the Star a couple of years ago, I was told that the `C' in NX-10C stood
>   for `Commodore' and that all Commodore machines would therefore run OK
>   with it.
>    
>   It turns out that this printer has been modified to run only in serial
>   mode, and has a couple of 5-pin DIN interfaces at the back, and no
>   other interface.
    
    The 'C' says that the printer has the Commodore (PET/VIC-20/C=64/C=128)
    serial port interface AND that it speaks Commodore's "PETSCI" rather
    than standard ASCII.  Essentially, the printer does a high-quality
    emulation of a C=1525 printer and may (or may not) offer the other
    features of the standard NX-series Star printers.
    
>   One dealer I went to had a cable which could physically connect the
>   Amiga to the Star - ie. a parallel plug with a DIN at the other end,
>   but when we tried printing, the Amiga kept saying `No paper in
>   printer'.
    
    It would take more than a cable to make this combination work.  You'd
    need an appropriate Amiga printer driver to cause the parallel port to
    emulate the Commodore serial bus AND to either lock the printer into
    transparent ASCII mode (if it has same) or to translate ASCII to PETSCI
    (with some loss of information -- they're not fully equivalent).  I'm
    unfamiliar with any such product.
    
>   I then rang the mob who sold me all this gear and they said
>   
>   (a)	You need to buy a graphics interface (whatever that may be) for
>   $125 and the parallel output fron the A500 will be converted to serial;
    
    This would do the inverse of what the C=64/128 parallel interfaces do. 
    See the comment above.
    
>   (b)	Sell the Star NX-10C to a C64 fan for as much as you can get and buy 
>   a Star NX1000 for $379 (b&w) or $429 (colour). Their preferred option!
    
    In the long run, this will be the only viable option.  You may be able
    to get your NX-10C to work using a magic cable and printer driver, but
    you'll lose much of the functionality that the rest of us have come to
    expect.  I take it that the prices they've quoted aren't U.S. Dollars
    -- you can buy a 24-pin Panasonic KXP-1124 for less than that through
    careful shopping in the U.S.  Then you'd have a printer with 360x360dpi
    capability that produces SUPERB output at a reasonable price.

    Stupid question of the week: how about changing your prefs for the
    printer to use the serial line and then connect the printer to that?
    
    Of course, that means you have to manually multiplex the one port
    between modem, printer, and whatever else you have that needs a 
    serial line, but at least you don't have to buy a new printer!
    
    Yours
    Erg

    Re .1:
    
    Thanks for the detailed answer.  I understand the circumstances better
    now, and will look out for the Panasonic printer you mentioned.  BTW,
    the prices are in Australian dollars, and gear here typically costs
    50-100% more in Aussie dollars than the US prices we see in magazines. 
    Our exchange rate is presently around A$1.00 = US%0.80, so the usual
    dealer `early retirement' scheme is operating well.
    
    Re .2:
    
    Sounds like it's worth a try, even if as an interim measure.  I will
    need to acquire a cable with Amiga serial on one end and 5-pin DIN on
    the other.  I'll see what happens.
    
    As a general comment, I guess I was hoping that some way of changing
    the interface inside the printer was possible.  After all, the printer
    itself is not different from other Star NX-10s; only this way of
    getting info to it.  Would it be possible to replace the interface card
    inside the printer with a parallel interface from a `dead' equivalent
    printer - providing one could be found ...?
    
    Regards,
    
    Kass
    Canberra, Australia

    Simply wiring it up to your Amiga's serial port probably won't work,
    and could possibly damage the computer, printer or both.  The C64 bus
    transfers data in a serial manner, but it may employ signals with very
    different *electrical* characteristics than the RS232/422/423 standards
    supported by typical "serial" ports.
    
    Ethernet and CI ports are "serial", but you don't expect a terminal to
    plug directly into either of those, do you?

    Re .4:
    
>   Simply wiring it up to your Amiga's serial port probably won't work,
>   and could possibly damage the computer, printer or both.  The C64 bus
>   transfers data in a serial manner, but it may employ signals with very
>   different *electrical* characteristics than the RS232/422/423 standards
>   supported by typical "serial" ports.
    
    Bruce is ABSOLUTELY correct here.  The C=64/128 serial port is in fact
    a 1-bit wide IEEE 488 bus with TTL (5VDC) logic levels.  The RS232
    standard specifies 12VDC logic levels (for some reason that's probably
    related to some particular vacuum tube interface from days gone by),
    which could do serious damage to the Amiga.
    
    You can build a fairly simple interface to correct the voltages, but
    even then you would still be faced with both the IEEE 488 "handshake"
    and ASCII->PETSCI character transliteration issues.  (That's what
    device drivers are for, if you need a challenging task to keep you
    busy for a few weeks. 8^)

>    a 1-bit wide IEEE 488 bus with TTL (5VDC) logic levels.  The RS232
>    standard specifies 12VDC logic levels (for some reason that's probably
>    related to some particular vacuum tube interface from days gone by),

I always thought it was related to improving noise margins over long cable 
lengths.

john
    

    Folks,
    
    Thanks for the last three notes - it's just as well I'm slack (and
    didn't know where to start) so I haven't tried the serial option.
    
    Some of the more technical types here in the office suggested leaving
    the printer attached to the C64, and somehow cabling the Amiga to the
    C64 in order to use it as a 64K print buffer.  Is this totally a weird
    idea or what?
    
    Otherwise, it's up for sale and I buy a printer that works.
    
    Regards,
    
    Kass
    

    	Setting your C=64 up as a buffer/interchange is possible but would
    require significant amounts of programming to get it to work - and
    you'd still lose some information in the PETSCII/ASCII translation. The
    most sensible solution, if you really want to keep the equipment, would
    be to modem the data files over to a C=64 disk and print them from the
    C=64. Does that sound like a kludge to you ?  Yeah. The only reasonable
    solution is the one you've considered - sell it and buy something new.
    	I can second that recommendation for the Panasonic KXP1124, we have
    one on our clone (hers, not mine) and it turns out some very nice
    quality printing. It replaced a daisy-wheel printer and is about 10
    times as fast with little loss of print quality. Quieter, too. I
    understand that the equivalent Star and Epson machines are similarly
    wonderful.