Newbie questions - EAS Microstep

[Torchhead]

Good post Ron!

Dave:
As for running with a slow laptop under Windows 98 you are not going to be able to use MACH2 or 3. You could run under DOS (boot to DOS) with TurboCNC or in Windows DeskCNC with the external pulsing card. With the prices of 1G + processor machines as low as they are it's difficult to justify trying to make a laptop work.

MACH3 looks intimidating when you first see it but it is customizable (you can modify the screens and setup profiles). I wrote a real simple screen for my little table top router/engraver while for my big plasma its got lots more buttons and controls. Support is excellent and the software is constantly under development with new features being added at astounding rates. There are 5000+ members on the Yahoo support list and their www.machsupport.com site.

[Ron111]

Dave,
The stepper motors that I've looked at and have used in the past give you the option of connecting them bipolar (series or parellel) or unipolar. Look at the keling steppers and go to their website(they advertise here so go to the advertisers list or click on their ad if you see it) and look at their spec sheets and you can see the different configurations that they can be connected. When you look at these motors, they will have eight wires, but they can be connected for any of the three mentioned configurations.

Ron