Fun with cables

[ksmith]

I was pretty excited a few days ago when atimson on karentraviss's LJ referred me to a site that had Mac drivers for my favorite old faithful parallel-only HP 1100 LaserJet, as well as to an online shop that sold parallel-to-USB adapters. I downloaded the drivers, then purchased the cable and waitedwaitedwaited until today when the cable arrived--and I opened the box--only to find--that the cable didn't fit.

Most adapters are apparently Type B parallel-to-USB. My HP1100 uses the less common Type C parallel connector, dammit. C-to-USB adapters are apparently rare to nonexistent. There was even a discussion about it in one of the HP chatrooms--that's how I found out what type of adapter I needed.

Well, Belkin claims that if they don't have an adapter in stock, they will make it. I will give them a call tomorrow and see whether they can tackle this.

Now, isn't there an issue when printer cables are too long? The cable I do have is a Type C (Centronics 36F) to a DB25M. Add a DB25F to USB A and I should be good to go, unless the 12' or so cord is an issue.

The things I'm going through to try and get this printer going...

Comments

[daveamongus.livejournal.com]

I don't think there are length issues with printer cables... so long as it is the standard sort that you seem to have. SCSI cables can only go so many feet (six?), while CAT5 network cable tends to have issues at and beyond 100m. But I know you can take a printer cable out at least to 50ft with no problem.