MACH3 Laptop Success Stories

[fatal-exception]

This one works:

http://cgi.ebay.com/TOSHIBA-TECRA-S1...QQcmdZViewItem

[LeeWay]

This is the one I have.
http://cgi.ebay.com/IBM-ThinkPad-R40...QQcmdZViewItem

It's a Thinkpad R40.
I think I was trying to use 201's initially with a straight through BOB. That may have been the cause of the rough running steppers. I also found some things to diable in the bios as well as some of the IBM settings. I did have a problem that caused my router to crash and cut through a toggle clamp. I had screen saver and power settings set to none of course. No hibernation and always on.
Well the screen timed out and went black. Mach crashed when that happened. I finally got into the IBM features and found a little icon at the top that disables all time out settings.
It no longer times out and works great. Cost me a $22 carbide router bit and a $7 toggle clamp to find that little jewel of an issue. I also went back through and turned off all other services that I didn't think I would need. She is running pretty bare, but doing a great job now.

[pminmo]

Well, I think I've got my Dell C610 working with MACH3, at least I'm getting good flatline driver tests now. Seems like the Dell Bios doesn't really alow you to stop the processor speedstep to save battery and power like it gives you the impression it does. And I wasn't aware that the P3 at 1GHZ had speedstep, thought it was externally controlled clock speed, but Nooooo. More in a few days, I'm off line till Tuesday. Bottom line, the newer processors are changing speeds to save power, this may get to be a desktop issue as well. The key, winxp idle process allows the processor to cycle throttle down.

[topazx2]

Well, I think I've got my Dell C610 working with MACH3, at least I'm getting good flatline driver tests now. Seems like the Dell Bios doesn't really alow you to stop the processor speedstep to save battery and power like it gives you the impression it does. And I wasn't aware that the P3 at 1GHZ had speedstep, thought it was externally controlled clock speed, but Nooooo. More in a few days, I'm off line till Tuesday. Bottom line, the newer processors are changing speeds to save power, this may get to be a desktop issue as well. The key, winxp idle process allows the processor to cycle throttle down.

I've got a C610 as well that I'd like to eventually use on my mill. Please let me know if you get this timing issue worked out.
-Dan Gates

[dertsap]

you should be able to disable the speed step
http://www.bay-wolf.com/speedstep.htm#7

[Jason3]

Hi,

I know this thread is a few months old now but I thought I'd add my experiences with laptops and Mach3. I've used Compaq Evo N1000 and Compaq NX7010 laptops both with and without a smoothstepper and have had only minor issues without the smoothstepper - the machine would hesitate when the display went to sleep on the N1000 (I know, I should disable that). No issues at all with the smoothstepper.

I've also run a Mach3 on an Apple Macbook Pro running XP via Bootcamp using the smoothstepper - that went fine too, until the MBP developed a random reboot problem not related to mach3 or the smoothstepper. Sure looked strange, a Mac running a CNC machine

Sounds like I was lucky...

Jason

[pminmo]

Heres a little bit of a writeup on how I got my Dell C610 running: http://pminmo.com/PMinMOwiki/index.php5?title=Laptops I'll try to follow it up with a video of the results for those who don't believe it can be done .....

[Dougal]

At the risk of grave-digging.

Where do I find a mach3 driver test and how do I run it?
I'm using a dell 600m (aka d600) with a powered breakout board and I'm trying to find the source of a stepper motor tick.

[Jason3]

Hi Dougal,

I thought the Drivertest.exe file should be in your Mach3 folder...?

Do you have another PC you could use to test your machine to rule out the laptop as the source of your problem? I can probably lend you a Smooth stepper to try if you'd like, many people find they solve the major problems running Mach3 on laptops.

Best regards,

Jason

[Dougal]

Hi Dougal,

I thought the Drivertest.exe file should be in your Mach3 folder...?

Oh, that one. Oops.
Yes I've run that before, just did it again and paid more attention. It flat lines occasionally at 80 us for about 6-10mm of screen width. How significant is that?
The rest of the time it behaves well. I haven't stripped the configuration of this machine down yet, I just installed mach3 trial and started learning.

Do you have another PC you could use to test your machine to rule out the laptop as the source of your problem? I can probably lend you a Smooth stepper to try if you'd like, many people find they solve the major problems running Mach3 on laptops.

Best regards,

Jason

All of my PC's here are laptops. Sourcing an old desktop isn't a problem but I'd much prefer to get this laptop working for many reasons.
Thank you for the offer to lend a smooth-stepper. I've got a lot more hunting to do before I nail down the problem but when I get time I'd like to take up that offer.
Would you like to trial my CNC Brain at the same time.

[pminmo]

Oh, that one. Oops.
Yes I've run that before, just did it again and paid more attention. It flat lines occasionally at 80 us for about 6-10mm of screen width. How significant is that?

That's bad! It needs to be flat line, period with tiny, tiny possible minor glitches.

[Dougal]

That's bad! It needs to be flat line, period with tiny, tiny possible minor glitches.

I see. I'll have a go at killing un-necessary processes and see how it helps.
I'll start with not using the internet through the wifi.