Hello all,

The company I work for bought a CNC 8060Z CNC machine from ebay. It uses USB 2.0 for the controller to computer connection. Mach 3 is what it uses. I have seen plenty of discussions about USB controllers/boards, but absolutely nothing about these china controllers that support USB, everything is parallel port it seems.

When I go to jog my axis motors via arrow keys or the pendent, they do not move. I have run this on two computers running 64 bit windows 10 (maybe that's why?) so far. I have set my ports and pins to the same that most people have. Spindle works fine.

Is there a separate USB driver required for this?

Pictures here : https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B6gzpeTme6nOVk9IRHY2RGpRdmM?usp=sharing

Thank you,

Joe P.

Mach3 will not work with Win10 or 64 bit, and no Laptops either

Thank you for the quick reply, I will get my hands on a new computer and try it out!

Joe P.

Hi,
Mach will work on 32 or 64 bit OS's but the parallel port will work ONLY on 32 bit.

An external motion controller would be fine, there are some which are USB into the PC but DB25
out. They are way WAY smarter than a converter. It may be, from your description, what has been
supplied. Note the Chinese made controllers have given a lot of grief over the years. CNCdrive or
PMDX do USB to Parallel  external controllers with the right plugin and they have a great rep for
backup.

My suggestion is don't waste money on another PC just get a decent controller.

Craig

I’m confused Craig because this site
http://www.machsupport.com/software/mach3/
under the requirements tab states Mach3 works only with 32 bit OS (64 bit will not work)

Hi Nicolas,
Mach3 or Mach4 will run on 32 OR 64 bit. Its the parallel port which is picky, it will ONLY run on 32 bit OS.

If you consider Mach3 in its entirety, that is to say the GUI/trajectory planner AND its 'native' parallel port, then by virtue of the PP
then you can ONLY use 32 bit. If, like me, you consider Mach3 as two components, the GUI/Planner and the separate pulse engine/parallel
port and you only want the GUI/Planner then you can use either 32 or 64 bit. This of course requires a substitute for the PP usually called an
external motion controller, the UC100 and the SmoothStepper being popular examples.

When Mach3 power up a window should open that allows you to choose your motion controller for this session. If you have a PP installed (ie a 32 bit OS)
and say a USB connected motion controller like the UC100 you could choose between the two. In fact you could have more, you might have an EtherNet
connected SmoothStepper as well, it will be in the list, just select the one you want. For them to be on the list the plugin for the device (PP or UC100 or ESS)
must be in the Plugins folder of Machs Directory.

Usually once you've selected your motion device you will just leave Mach that way in future sessions. There is a check box which allows you to hide the select
window at startup and speed things up. Its common to check it. In order then to see the window go to Function Cfg's/Reset Device Sel...and you will then
have access to the window and your choice will be enacted on restart of Mach.

Craig

No worries, we had a computer here already. Win 7 32 bit. If this does not work we will get an external controller.

I installed mach 3 on it, however when I plugged the USB into the computer, it said it could not find the "XHC Mach3 Card"

I'm assuming this is a driver that I need. Anyone know where I can find it?

Joe P.

Thanks Craig for the explanation

No worries, we had a computer here already. Win 7 32 bit. If this does not work we will get an external controller.

I installed mach 3 on it, however when I plugged the USB into the computer, it said it could not find the "XHC Mach3 Card"

I'm assuming this is a driver that I need. Anyone know where I can find it?

Joe P.

http://www.cdxhctech.com/html/edownloads/

Tweakie.

Tweakie,

Thank you for this resource!

Unfortunately I cannot find the "XHC Mach3 Card Driver", only the "XHC Mach4 Card Driver"

Any other drivers I could try that are present on the site?

Thank you,

Joe P.