Parallel ports can often be set up as bi directional ports, for the onboard ports you set that in the BIOS, for PCI ports it can occasionally be set by jumpers or it is often self detecting, there are some however that just can't be set up as BiDirectional.
 What make/model is your secondary port?
Hood

It is made by sunix, I will get the model details and spec tomorrow when in work. I have tried a couple of other cards and no luck with them either but they do work fine for controlling the driver/motors. Is there a particular recommended model for this kind of thing?

Have you enabled the Pins 2-9 as Inputs for the second port?
Not really sure which cards work best as I have not used the parallel port for about 2 yrs now on any of my machines. If you do a search there are a few posts about PCI cards that work with Mach which have been posted in the last few months I think.

Hood

Just looked and both of the current sunix cards seem to be enhanced ports.
Hood

Dougie329

I have put a new post here to tell you why you are not going to get this working the way you are going about it.

The CNC4PC setup page says set Mach pins 2-9 as inputs but and its a big but, the pins 2-9 are outputs on the parallel port, that is what the C22 does it converts the signals, something that certain BOB's can do also.

Essential things that you seem unwilling to spend money on.

Phil

Well I have exactly the same problem as douqie329 but I have the C-22 board installed.  It made NO difference in my setup and I am still without a fully functional pendant.  And my Output #6 LED is still on as well.  For the cost of the C-22 card it wouldn't hurt to try it just to cover all the bases.  I even went with a higher end LPT PCI card and it didn't help.  This is the card I used (SIIG CyberPro PCI to Parallel Adapter JJ-P00112-S5) and it was recommended by someone on this board who was having similar problems with his pendant and it solved his problem, so I tried it.  Unfortunately it didn't help me.

John

Phill, you can opt to set pins 2-9 as Inputs in Mach for a second parallel port, some parallel ports can't do that however if they are just standard ports, they need to be set up as enhanced ports.
Hood

 

Phil

Hi John

I am going to order a C22 interface off Arturo today and see if it fixes the issue. If it doesnt then it must be a common port or settings problem that we are having. I will let you know how I get on.

dougie,
 not sure if you saw what I asked earlier but do you definitely have Port 2 Pins 2-9 enabled as Inputs in Mach?

Hood

yep definately have pins 2-9 box ticked. Arturo sent a couple C22 boards out yesterday for me so hopefully they will arrive next week and I know I will have that part of things done correctly.

I have plugged everything back in as normal with the gecko/motors to LPT1 and pendant to LPT2.

If I open the jog pane by pressing tab I can move the axis using the keys in continuous mode, nothing happens in MPG mode.

If I disable all the brains nothing at all but when I press the enable button I get a green light coming on in diagnostics, with all brains disabled the LED is not on. As soon as I enable the axis_jogres_selector_ brain the red light comes on but so does the input#6 red light.