Have problems with G201 and printer port

[Christian]

Hello all,
I have just uppgraded from my old unipolar drivers to Gecko G201. Now I encountered a problem - the G201 needs common +5V for step and direction and there are no +5V in the parallel port. Thought I could take it from PS2 but its only about 4.7V on my laptop and together with the problem of parallel port pins not sinking the current enough I dont know how to solve it.

I was thinking of switching to a hardware interface (as a solution to the parallel port problem) but it seems stupid coz I like the Mach 2 software interface that I use now. Also there are some costs connected with a new hardware interface that I didn't really expect.

Thankfull for any help on this problem!
-Christian

[Mariss Freimanis]

By all means take it from your PS2 mouse connector. The 4.7V will be OK. The current draw is only what's necessary to operate the optoisolator; 16mA per channel.

Mariss

[Christian]

Mariss

For what it's worth: No, 4.7V is not okay and the parallel port couldn't sink the current enough (it is a laptop). Don't know if it was both or just one of the cause but now it's fixed. I put a pull-up 4K7 resistor from each parallel port pin to a external +5V power source. Fixed!

Thanks anyway
-Christian