*BSD News Article 83866


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From: Andrew Gordon <andrew.gordon@net-tel.co.uk>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: PLIP hardware problems
Date: Sat, 30 Nov 1996 00:17:48 +0000
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Gunther Schadow wrote:
> I have problems linking my notebook to my workstation via PLIP. I
> soldered a Laplink cable and failed to get PLIP up and running with my
> i586/133/PCI workstation (NEPUMUK), which has big SCSI drives, a DAT
> tape and the modem line to the world. As a last resort I plugged the
> notebook into my older i486DX/33/ISA box (PLOCUS) instead and PLIP works
> just fine! The two PCs are linked by an ethernet and thus there is --
> though cumbersome -- way to reach NEPUMUK from the notebook.

How fast is your notebook?  One possibility is that your 586 is too
fast,
particularly if the LPT port is genuinely on the PCI bus (rather than
being
on an ISA bus bridged from it).  Unfortunately, the lp driver has to
rely
on software timing loops for handshaking/timeout.

You could try increasing the values of LPMAXSPIN1 and LPMAXSPIN2
in /sys/i386/isa/lpt.c, eg. by inserting in your kernel config

options "LPMAXSPIN1=16000"
options "LPMAXSPIN2=2000"


> The PCI board is a Gigabit GA-588ATS. In the chipset setup I can
> configure the parallel port mode to "SPP", "EPP", "ECP", and "ECP+EPP".

This won't make any difference.  FreeBSD does not activate any of the
advanced modes, so all will behave the same.