LPT ports needed for a mill

[clutch]

Howdy, this is my first post to cnczone, I've been lurking for a while.

I want to build a 3 axis mill initially with a 4th axis (A) for gear cutting and dial engraving down the road.

How many parallel ports would I need? Are there pci cards out there that are recommended with multiple ports?

Thanks,

Clutch

[acondit]

You can run a 3-axis mill from a single parallel port, but take a look at the Mesa 5I20 pci card. It has lots of IO and encoder support also. You might also take a look at Mesa's 7I43. I believe that it will run off of a single epp parallel port.

Alan

[clutch]

The 5I20 looks like a nice board. I'm still trying to figure my way. Likely you noticed that from my question. From what I saw, if I decided to make some big iron full servo that dog can hunt.

I bought a breakout board from Keling Technology today and some steppers and other bits from electronic goldmine to make a stepper driver. Stepper doesn't have enough torque to do much useful other than let me see EMC2 working.

I have so much to learn.

Clutch