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From: rbraun@spdcc.COM (Rich Braun)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.programmer,comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Connecting COM to a line printer
Message-ID: <2305@ursa-major.SPDCC.COM>
Date: 30 Mar 90 03:38:04 GMT
Reply-To: rbraun@ursa-major.spdcc.COM (Rich Braun)
Organization: S.P. Dyer Computer Consulting, Cambridge MA
Lines: 30

I just bought a line printer which has the following three serial protocals
available:

	- XON/XOFF
	- ETX/ACK
	- Reverse Channel (hardware flow control)

I'd like to connect it to my MS-DOS 386-based system using one of the COM
ports, using hardware flow control if possible.  I'd also like to use the
print spooler which comes with PC-Kwik (a Multisoft product).

None of the documentation I have talks about how the COM device driver
handles the hardware signals, and I don't recall whether it can deal with
hardware signal-driven flow control.

Do I have to write my own device driver, or can PC-Kwik handle this in
some way that I don't know?  Do I have to use XON/XOFF?  (If the latter,
what hardware signals need to be connected in order for data to be
transmitted?)

I've already spent about 6 hours fidgeting around with different combina-
tions of signals and am about to go out and buy an RS232 breakout box.
Send me e-mail or post information if you know how to handle this problem.

FYI:  the printer is a NEC L-600, and the COM port is on a no-name Taiwanese
multi-feature card.

Thanks!

-rich