Connecting old Epson printer to Vista OS

misterthrifty

Hi
I wanted to connect my old Epson Stylus Color 800 printer to a new Vista computer. I bought a parallel port to USB cable as there is no parllel plug on the computer and the hardware was 'found' when I plugged it in and Vista confirmed it was ready to use.....however, it won't print!

I have checked on Vista and it does have drivers but is it just a problem with the printer using a USB as it's so old? Any advice appreciated.

Mr T

iviv

When you say it has drivers, are those the ones that vista installed for it? Have you checked the Epson website for more up to date drivers?
Does the printer only have a parallel connection? If it also has USB, try buying a usb printer cable to connect it through USB.
Finally, are you sure the printer works? If you have another computer to hand, try printing with it (using the same cable setup).

sparkyboy22

You may find that the problem is the cable.

You usually have to have drivers installed for the cable converter as well as the printer.

Make sure you have installed anything that came with the cable then try again.

iviv

sparkyboy22 wrote: »

You may find that the problem is the cable.

You usually have to have drivers installed for the cable converter as well as the printer.

Make sure you have installed anything that came with the cable then try again.

Say what? I may be wrong, but I've not heard of a cable converter needing its own drivers before.

superscaper

sparkyboy22 wrote: »

You may find that the problem is the cable.

You usually have to have drivers installed for the cable converter as well as the printer.

Make sure you have installed anything that came with the cable then try again.

You may want to delete the link in your signature (forum rules).

superscaper

iviv wrote: »

Say what? I may be wrong, but I've not heard of a cable converter needing its own drivers before.

It's true though. It may depend on the convertor manufacturer but AFAIK, USB to Parallel converters do need driver installed (so the USB port understands the communication from the parallel pins, it's not a case of the data and standards being the same and simply correlating one wire/pin to another).

Conor_3

Personally I'd throw the cable in the bin. You can buy a PCI card that'll add Serial and Parallel ports to your PC giving you a port you can connect the printer to. . They're under a tenner and it'll solve all the problems.

BUT as far as Vista is concerned, its an end of life profuct. All is not lost though. A company has brought out a "one fits all" driver which works on any printer from any manufacturer - the Xerox Global Printer Driver. More here: http://www.xerox.com/global