[Steve F]

Hello all,

I mentioned in another thread that I had aquired a Prolight 2500, and after getting it home and powered up I have a problem I need to resolve. It's bone stock with a 42K spindle and has the software already loaded on a Dell Percision 340 with XP Pro and is set up as DOS mode only. After numerous attemps of swaping out USB mouses and the earlier type with the socket ,I get no mouse action period. I see power going to the usb one, as it eluminates, but at this point I "think" there are no mouse drivers present, nor am I that well versed in DOS. I'm a CNC machinist, not an IT guy. Could anyone give a little guidance on getting this monster to work please?

Thanks ,Steve

[allenj20]

It's a DOS program so it may not even use a mouse. Here's the manual for the 2000 I believe they are similar.

http://studiomode.nu/wiki/wp-content...light_2000.pdf

I would download that before it goes poof and disappears. But not from the DOS machine :rainfro:

[Steve F]

Thanks for the response allenj20. I appreciate the link too It used to work with a mouse before our IT guys moved eveything to this computer and fell by the wayside about correcting it. There are plenty of areas on the user screen once the PLM2000 program runs and pretty much leaves me high and dry trying to control it without the mouse. I guess I'm looking for step by step instructions for loading of some driver file in dos if that is possible?


Thanks Again,Steve

EDIT............That is a very good download,Thanks again..........according to it there "are" ways to function without the mouse (tab key)AND do not load a mouse driver AFTER the PLM2000 software, it must be done before. So I wonder if I should reload my XP disc and re-aquiring windows and the mouse driver...then reload the Prolight stuff as a new install? Whatca think? I sure would prefer a mouse

[allenj20]

So you mentioned it is running Windows XP pro in DOS only mode. But there is no such thing as DOS only mode in Windows XP Pro. Since Windows 2000 was released Windows is no longer built on top of DOS it just has a DOS shell inside of windows. I may not be understanding what you are saying.

If it were me I would run this under Windows 98 that was DOS based you can boot that straight to a command prompt and it would be about the right vintage for this machine. Cheap way to do that without violating copyright would be to snag an old Win 98 install disk off ebay for like 30 bucks. I think your mouse will work with Windows 98 but I would stick with the PS/2 type on that not USB which did not even exist by default in Windows until Windows 98 SE I believe.

Your IT guy probably wanted to get rid of Windows 98 or DOS because it is old and so replaced it with XP and broke your mouse support.

[Steve F]

You are correct, they dumped the XP and loaded straight DOS (if that is how you say it?) and that makes sense as to why the driver is nonexistent. I do have both a XP Pro and Windows 98 disc ,and possibly a Windows 95. I also have a laptop that has Win 98 on it, perhaps I should leave the Dell alone and try loading the PLM2000 on it, not sure if it has a port for the cable to the RS232 port though, I'll have to look at that. Also the Dell is real power house for CAD, seems a waste just for DOS. Well you got my gears turning now Such a delemia


Cheers,Steve

[allenj20]

Another option is Free DOS which is an open source reimplementation of good old DOS http://www.freedos.org/. These crazy people have even added support for USB, mice, TCP/IP etc... so you can even surf the web from your old DOS machine. But since you are not a computer guy that may be a bit much for ya.

However if you have a friend that's a computer guy that you could pay in beer and pizza that could be an option to have him install. Actually it's not really that hard and they do have step by step docs on the web for Free DOS installation. So if you feel adventurous... One thing though you will need a copy of the machine control original software either a backup to another disk or the original working disks. Don't go formatting anything if you don't have a backup of the machine control software as that could be hard to come by these days. In fact just go ahead and make sure you have a couple of backups of that software regardless of what you decide to do.

[Steve F]

Thanks and yes Sir, I have the machine control software stashed on a couple of discs and copies on my hard drive at work,plus the original. And thanks to your manual pdf, all the instructions to load it.

[allenj20]

Ok if you have a Windows 98 disk I would go for that with this system.

Whatever machine you decide to use for the machine controller I would have it do only that one thing. I would not use it for anything else. Machine controllers are real time applications meaning they should not multi task with other processes. If the machine controller is running nothing else should be allowed to interrupt it say like for network communications for example. Actually DOS is well suited for this type of embedded work because it has low level access to the hardware directly and it is purely single tasking meaning nothing should be able to interrupt it. For eample on my mach controller I don't hook it to the network and I run nothing on it but mach I don't want anything interrupting mach while it's doing it's thing.

Well anyway I hope I am not confusing you.

Cheers, Allen

[Steve F]

So I should record all my settings like the Xo on/off and all those,over write the brains on the Dell with W98,then open a dos shell ,....load the PLM2000 stuff and give it a whirl from there.......Leaving it a dedicated machine for milling......I guess I have nothing to lose.................now to go find my disc

[allenj20]

Yeah I think a good move would be to set it up on a second machine. If you have an old machine laying around that has serial ports that should be fine you won't need much to run software from the 90s. But the good thing is by doing it that way you can take your time and get it working and also compare the settings with what you have on the dell plus if all else fails the dell still works albeit without mouse.

If you need an old machine of course ebay, craigslist and freecycle should get you one of that vintage easily I bet you could get one for free if you look around.

[Arich0908]

I dont know much bout your machine. I know i owned a sever made by dell and it would except a usb mouse or P2P I forget but one of the wouldnt work with the server . This was only a few years ago. Try switching to a new one. Or going in Device manger and seeing if all is ok.
Maybe you need to update drivers.
Good Luck

[Steve F]

Thanks for your reply Arich0908.

I'm following the format in the manual for functioning without a mouse right now. As of 5:15 this morning I'm happy to report........IT WORKS !!!:banana: It isn't all that hard being mouse-less Now to think up some sort of million dollar product and let her rip !! Thanks all for your help!:cheers:

[airamp]

Steve,

Use a PS2 mouse not a USB.

I use Win 98 setup on a 900mhz machine.

The program is dos based and is installed under root directory.(Ie: C

So go to Dos in windows98 and install it.

Type exit to go back to windows.

Right click while on the desktop and make a (NEW) (Shortcut). Then in the popup window (Browse) find PLM2000 folder in (C,

Double click on it , Find plm2000 and Click on it once and then click OK. It next should give you a choice of symbols for your desktop to represent the program link. Pick one. (I use the dinamite one).

Done.



Now you just have to click on the desktop symbol link and the program starts.

Glad to hear you have it running...

AirAmp

[Arich0908]

....edit

[Steve F]

Thank You airamp!:cheers:

[airamp]

Steve,

One more thing..

This is cool.

Right click on the desktop icon for PLM2000 then Propertys.

You will get a window with many tabs.

You can set memory, color, ect.

Most important is to go to the tap screen.

Click the Full Screen option. then OK and close it.

Now when you open the program it will be FULL SCREEN.

when you close it it goes back to your desktop (close by File tab in PLM2000).

Check it out it works great.

Mike

[Steve F]

Well, I ran into a small snag with a program. I had file loaded from a floppy that was 84.4 KB's. The message was that it was to large to run and suggested using SPLIT.EXE to break it down. I had never dealt with that before so I went "fishing" for it......finally found it and applied it to the program which broke it down to 8 separate programs and refered to them as -1,-2...and so forth. I went to run -1 and would not start the spindle and proceed to single step through it very slowly. What am I doing wrong, and does any one know how lines of code are the max for running it this manner? Also, could I run a program from a CD, and how would I address that, or straight from the floppy to by pass the too large part? Thanks very much for suggestions and I did call Light Machines and they couldn't help

Cheers,Steve

[airamp]

Hi Steve,

Did you download the manual for the Prolight 2000?

It has the split instruction in it and how to use it.

I would download it to the hard drive and run it from that not a floppy or CD.

Read times are faster and a Dos program might have trouble going from the hard drive to floppy or CD.

I have not done this but it makes sence to link the programs in the program and have it on the hard drive so (and be able to see it in file, open in the PLM2000) without going to another drive..

AirAmp

[Steve F]

Hi Airamp,

Yes, I did download the manual, again, thanks for that link. I'll have to read it a little closer as I missed that part on splitting. I did download the program to the hard drive and I called it up to run that is when I recieved....file to large to load.........message. I give it another whirl here tonight Thanks for your input:cheers:

[airamp]

Steve,

Load your program to the hard drive also. Then edit it with clipboard with the splits and add the link to the last line for the next section of the program.

You can split it up with clipboard into the smaller programs then get it into the PLM2000. (Rename it .NC don't forget)

good luck,

AirAmp