I have acquired a Sherline lathe with a Flashcut system already installed. I was told it came out of a working environment and that it should be functional. Flashcut customer service said there is no easy way to tell which version of the Flashcut software will work with this system. They advised me to just try version 1 and 2. I have tried ver 1, 2 and 3. I always get an error that :Flashcut CNC could not open serial port COM1.

I have verified the port is set up correctly in Windows XP Pro, and also in BIOS. I have also connected a serial printer to the port and successfully printed a test page on it, verifying the port is set up correctly. Now I am just wondering if the signal generator is bad. When I turn on the signal generator and driver, the stepper motors all turn on, verified by the fact that they are all locked up and I cannot turn them by hand. Based on the diagrams in the manual for the 401A, I am using a db9 null modem cable with full handshake. I called Flashcut support today and they said they thought that was the right cable to be using. I don't have another non null cable to try, not even sure I should as it seems like this is the right cable. Just wondering if anyone here has any recommendations on what I should look at next to try and troubleshoot this.

Edit to add: I was getting that error after I installed the printer. I deleted the printer and now I get the error "Flashcut CNC cannot communicate with the signal generator". This is what I was getting before too, which made me wonder if it's the wrong cable.