*** DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES. The following OS/2 BIDI Port driver is created by IBM Corporation. The driver is provided prerelease without warranty of any kind. IBM shall not be liable for any damages arising out of your use of the driver, even if they have been advised of the possibility of such damages. ***The Bi-directional Parallel Port Printing Solution The bi-directional parallel port printing solution is a set of OS/2 executable files that enables the print spooler to communicate in both directions with parallel port attached printers. The print spooler uses this method of communication to identify printers (automatic presentation driver configuration), to query printer status and capabilities and to support remote operator panel features. In cases where ECP is able to be negotiated, a higher through put will be achieved and less system resources will be used (only when operating without Lexmark and HP protocol converters). ***OS/2 Supported versions This solution is prerelease and is supported for OS/2 Warp 4 and Warp Server for E-Business. Use of this Solution for OS/2 Warp 3 is Beta level only. Warp 3 requires a Warp 3 Spooler update available in OS/2 Warp 3 Fixpack 24. This solution will work in polling mode by default. To use interrupts, /LPTx (where x is 1,2,3) must be used. The switch is required to be in capital letters. Thus, LPT1 can be interrupt driven and LPT2 can be polled. i.e. BASEDEV=PAR1284.SYS /LPT1 will make only LPT1 use interrupts. ***Additional Drivers Required If Lexmark or HP printers are to be used bi-directionally, the most recent software from each manufacturer is needed. Lexmark Markvision can be obtained from www.lexmark.com and HP Jetadmin can be obtained from www.hp.com. Requires the latest Lexmark PCL5 printer driver supplied on this DDPAK. Look up your device and install the latest drivers. ***To Install The Bi-directional Parallel Port Printing Solution 1. Disable the spooler. Select OS/2 System Icon Select System Setup Right Mouse Select Spooler Icon Select Disable Spooler 2. Copy Drivers to the OS2\BOOT and OS2\DLL directories and update config.sys Select OS/2 System Icon Select System Setup Select Device Driver Install Enter the source directory containing the expanded driver files and bidi.ddp The three expanded files are: PAR1284.SYS parallel port driver PARALLEL.PDR DLL that interfaces between spooler and the driver PARALLEL.HLP help file Select Install Select Bi-directional Parallel Port Printing Beta Package Select OK The device drivers and the dynamic link libraries will be installed and CONFIG.SYS will be updated. Installing the bi-directional parallel port device driver copies the device driver to the \OS2\BOOT directory on your hard file and updates CONFIG.SYS with the statement BASEDEV=PAR1284.SYS /LPT1. It also copies the PARALLEL.PDR and PARALLEL.HLP files to the \OS2\DLL directory. Note: If the any file is older than the current version on the system, you may have to copy the file manually. 3. Enable the spooler Select OS/2 System Icon Select System Setup Right Mouse Select Spooler Icon Select Enable Spooler 4. Finally, the bi-directional parallel port device driver is a replacement for the OS/2 parallel port device driver (PRINT01.SYS). You must manually remove the OS/2 parallel port device driver from CONFIG.SYS. To do this, type TEDIT C:\CONFIG.SYS in an OS/2 window. Find the BASEDEV=PRINT01.SYS statement in CONFIG.SYS and insert REM at the beginning of the statement (e.g. REM BASEDEV=PRINT01.SYS). Save the CONFIG.SYS file, shutdown your system and reboot for the changes to take effect. 5. If Lexmark Markvision is to be used, the most current version can be obtained from www.lexmark.com. If HP Jetadmin is to be used, the most current version can be obtained from www.hp.com. ***Limitations 1. If an incompatible mode is negotiated with the printer and there is corrupted output, the mode can be changed manually in the port properties dialog for the appropriate LPTx port. 2. If unknown system hangs are experienced during printing, remove DEVICE=APM.SYS and DEVICE=VAPM.SYS from Config.sys. 3. If performance degrades while using the Lexmark Markvision software while printing. First try to lower the Read Intercharater timeout from the LPTx properties. It should be set to no lower than 5 msec (only for ECP mode). If this doesn't work, disable Bidi from the Bidi Settings. Make sure the spooler is disabled and the re-enabled before printing. 4. HP Printers may show incorrect status messages (Job in Printer remains after printing, etc). Contact HP (www.hp.com) for assistance. 5. HP Remote Control Panel will not find newer HP Printers ( will show up as unknown printer). Contact HP (www.hp.com) for assistance. 6. If the HP Jetadmin software is installed, it may cause problems with other non-HP printers that don't support all of its features. It will be necessary to uninstall HP JetAdmin if this is the case. 7. If using bidirectional mode, Markvision or JetAdmin installed, when a printer error such as memory overflow occurs, it may be necessary to reset the printer before being able to continue printing. 8. Some printers, such as the Deskjet 420, will negotiate to ECP but will not function properly. In this case, use the LPTx properties to set Nibble mode in the Advanced dialog. 9. If slow printing is experienced while using the Lexmark protocol converter, open the properties of the printer object and set the "Printer-specific format" checkbox of the "Queue options" dialog page. ***Additional Technical Information The parallel port signaling methods are defined in the IEEE - 1284 Specification (Standard Signaling Method for a Bi-Directional Parallel Port Peripheral Interface for Personal Computers). The query and status packets sent to parallel port devices adhere to the Network Printer Alliance (NPA) or Printer Job Language (PJL) specifications. For additional technical information please refer to the Printer Device Driver Reference, the Physical Driver Reference and the Input Output Device Driver Reference.