[idtkid]

Using a laptop with an onboard parallel port. My steppers jogged very very slowly so I decided to run drivertest.exe. Pulses per second started high (around 22,000) then fell off a cliff to a steady 96. Any suggestions as to why and how I can fix this? Thanks

[LUCKY13]

I would say you can't, this is what the driver test set it at because thats all it could maintain consistantly.


What kinda laptop is this ( proccessor size, memory, operating system)?

Laptops normally don't do to good for this when using the PP unless they are pretty new (which most dont have PP then) and they put out a good 5v signal instead of the 3.3v signal that most laptops put out.


If your really going to use a laptop I would suggest getting a SmoothStepper and run a the USB port. Depending on exactly what your laptop is there may be a chance to get it to do better, but that does depend on what it is.


Jess

[idtkid]

It is an IBM T42, 1 gig of ram and a 1.8Ghz Celeron with XP Pro SR2. Any chance this setup will work? Thanks Lucky, I will research the smoothstepper option in the meantime

[LUCKY13]

That is possible to work. You need to check and see if it puts out 5v or 3.3v on the PP port. If it puts out 3.3v you might be able to add a PCMIA card to it that puts out 5v and get it to work.


Also there may be something that is setup to keep the proccessor running a slow speeds to save battery power. You can get a program somehwere that will read the proccessor MHZ speed in real time and see if this might be happening. Somehwere on the forum there is a guide that tells many things you need to do to help a laptop (also the desktops) that can help them do better. You can go into the control panle and make sure there is no power saving options turned on, this can be one thing that slows down the CPU to save battery power.


I think even at its best its not going to do great, but it should do much better than it is. The SmoothStepper would be a sure fire way around it and they really work very good anyway. Besides it might be hard to find a good PP port card and you could spend quit abit before getting one that worked good if that was the problem. The SS is a no brainer and its only getting better as time goes by. Stilll check and make sure there is nothing that is slowing down the CPU like the power save settings. It might be a simple fix if so. Its nothing to see some CPU setups get p[ulled back as far as 200mkz on some systems and this would be a cause fro sure.


Jess

[ger21]

Try going through the optimization list on the download section of www.machsupport.com

[idtkid]

you guys are a huge help, thanks for the fast responses!

[idtkid]

Thanks again guys, going through that optimization list worked great! I seem to be limited to about 75 in the velocity field in mach3, anything higher will "spool up the motors" until they hit a certain rpm, the shafts will stop turning but the motor will continue to spin until I let off the jog key, then the shafts will start spinning again. Any reason why this is happening? Also, every revolution there is a click sound from the motors, any suggestions?