Hi Chelsey,
its not all doom and gloom.....Mach3 still works as well as it always did PROVIDED you keep it away from a PC which
gets Microsoft updates.
As you know Microsoft does not support XP anymore and consequently there are no updates for it....and for Mach users that is a good thing.
You can of course use Windows 7 but Microsoft do update that. You'll have to keep the PC off the internet or otherwise disable Windows updates.
The Windows 7 updates which are causing you grief affect the parallel port driver only. If you use an external motion controller like a SmoothStepper
then your installation would run fine. I understand that you don't want to spend any money but maybe its just too damn bad. I for a long time
persevered with the parallel port before I bought a SmoothStepper. I am delighted with it...it has bought so many advantages that I didn't realize
I was missing. A SmoothStepper is about $190US, if you are an Aussie then there a guy in Melbourne selling them, and how much is that relative to the
total cost of your CNC installation?. I've spent about $10,000 making my mill, $190US to get it to go right.....no brainer for me!
Craig