Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!dali.cs.montana.edu!milton!sumax!thebes!camco!bill From: bill@camco.Celestial.COM (Bill Campbell) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.fax Subject: Re: FAX/MODEM... why not? Message-ID: <1020@camco.Celestial.COM> Date: 18 May 91 16:52:59 GMT References: <2451@wet.UUCP> Organization: Celestial Software, Mercer Island, WA Lines: 41 In peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes: >On the contrary, it'd save one. Or you could put an even cheaper parallel >port and give me a use for the stupid parallel port on my computer. >-- >Peter da Silva; Ferranti International Controls Corporation; +1 713 274 5180; >Sugar Land, TX 77487-5012; `-_-' "Have you hugged your wolf, today?" This brings up a point I've discovered here. I'm running Stuart Lynne's Unix fax software (nee Unifax) and printing incoming faxes on my HP compatible laser printer. I ran into a problem when printing faxes via the parallel port. The system would slow down significantly while printing the graphics files, and occassionally the VGA monitor would get sent into some wierd state that required a system reboot. I remembered something I had read about problems with parallel printing under Xenix (I'm running Xenix 2.3.3GT on an Intel 303 33MHZ Caching 386). There have been several patches to fix slow printing problems under SCO Xenix since I started using it in 1988. I decided to move the printer to a serial port thinking that the Specialix drivers were probably more robust than the parallel printer. The results were great. Now I experience no slowdown while printing faxes, the VGA is fine, and printing isn't any slower (I'm transferring to the printer at 38,400 through an Intellicom 16K serial -> parallel buffer, converter). I'm seriously considering yanking/disabling all parallel ports from the system to free IRQ 5 and 7 for devices that cannot use the higher IRQs (Mice...). The other big benefit is that I have an external fax modem, printers, Trailblazer, and several terminals on a single slot in the system. Bill. -- INTERNET: bill@Celestial.COM Bill Campbell; Celestial Software UUCP: ...!thebes!camco!bill 6641 East Mercer Way uunet!camco!bill Mercer Island, WA 98040; (206) 947-5591