printer port to usb

[mocnc]

ok.....now bare with me, I hope this isn't too dumb of a question, but....is it as simple as buying an adaptor for printer port to usb to have the boards work off usb instead of the printer port? Just that desk tops are coming out without a printer port and I have a newer laptop that also doesn't have a printer port. If so can anyone recommend a good adaptor? One last question, I am looking for a 4 axis board(complete) that is already built and ready to go. I am hoping to get some advice from some of you to which one I should be looking at. Of course money is always the key factor here as well as shipping. I live in Ontario Canada and don't want to pay an arm or a leg for shipping. So basically, which one out there is my best bang for the buck.

[ger21]

USB to parallel adapters do NOT work. You can always add a PCI parallel card. Laptops don't always work well for CNC applications.

The best 4 axis drive is probably going to be the Gecko G540.

[Jeremy Harris]

If you're happy to just use Mach 3, then the Smoothstepper does a neat USB to parallel conversion, and adds lots of useful functionality, too, like independently generated pulse streams for the steppers, that don't rely on the PC or laptop generating evenly timed pulses.

Here's a link:

http://www.warp9td.com/

Jeremy