Connecting HP 600 printer/plotter

#21

It will have some way of configuring it.

#22

All done via the front panel controls AFAIK

#23

Point being, is it easier to have the jet direct box, or a Windows XP box? Needs testing, but I’d wager the JetDirect.

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#24

You still need windows XP if you want a friendly printing environment, because that’s the last version with a working driver.

The advantages of using JetDirect (internal or external) are

  • Faster transfer rates (parallel is limited to 10kB/s)
  • No need for parallel port on the host computer
  • In theory, multiple host computers, but this probably doesn’t apply to us. Given XP’s security holes, we probably don’t want the printing computer on the local network.

@frasco’s work with HP/GL is really cool, but doesn’t translate to “load document, click print” very well.

#25

If you want faster than parallel you’ll need to buy an internal card.
The JetDirect 170x uses a centronics cable to attach to printer.

I doubt that the line rate is the limiting factor on the printing rate.

My guess is that the slowest part will be converting the input to hpgl on a XP m/c

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#26

Is there really no project gutenberg CUPs driver?

#27

There is:

http://gimp-print.sourceforge.net/p_Supported_Printers.php

Why are we not using linux as a print server?

#28

Because luinx print drivers are always easy
:slight_smile:

#29

Not for this model there isn’t

Pasted image718×306 35 KB

These are all more modern DesignJets

#30

It says it is a HP DeskJet 600, it isn’t it is a HP DesignJet 600…

#31

Well HP says a C2847A is a HP DesignJet 600 Printer. A DeskJet 600 (C2184A) was one of the very early desktop monochrome printers (My brother still has one).

I’m confused as to how people intend to produce input. It’s a plotter not a printer!

Under linux you can use pstoedit to convert postscript and pdf originals to hpgl and you can always create stuff using inkscape.

Then all you need is a print queue pointed at the JetDirect.

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#32

Apparently the XP drivers work in Win 7

Which will let us print any greyscale content, not just vectors in HPGL.

#33

I see the guy in the link suggests using a JetDirect to connect with his 650C.

So the best plan is to set up the 600 as a network printer and people can use their own variant of hell to feed it input.

3 Likes
#34

I agree, although we should make sure there’s at least one working method in the space

#35

Result! Let’s still use jet direct though as it will allow flexible approaches from those who understand the complexities of hpgl

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#36

Look what I found :slight_smile:

IMG_20160610_103655103.jpg2592×1456 696 KB

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#37

As per the printer purge post…

Basically it’s probably dead.

#38

… I know it’s a slow response, but I’ve used a lot of these in the past.

HP’s old jetdirect servers, like this one, can be used as simply as opening a TCP connection to port 9100 on the jetdirect server, sending the HPGL, and closing the connection. On Unix machine, can use netcat or similar as well as spooling things like CUPS.

You can also send LPD to them, like in days of old (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_Printer_Daemon_protocol) but there’s no point unless that’s all the sender knows how to do.

For what it’s worth, it’s relatively straightforward (for a program!) to generate HPGL from SVG, Gcode or whatever. Straightfoward, but tedious.

Re config: some of them do have web servers, the older ones I believe only did things like DHCP.

Hope of some help to someone one day, even if this plotter is out to pasture.

J.

#39

HELLOOOO ALLL. Reviving this thread to talk about the old HP plotter 600.

WELL, what an experience I have had with this plotter but I am basically getting my plotter to run like so. A parallel port print server that I can configure as a TCP/IP printer. Once I set the IP address (here has been the hard part), I can set it up as a normal printer, EXCEPT there are NO drivers for this plotter. I can’t even get this thing printing with the XP drivers. The closest driver that works with this model on windows 7 is 430(E/AO). Everything was working fine until suddenly one day it starts printing everything inverted. Whole pages where there should be white are now printed in black. About at the end of the straw with this printer, I know for a fact that it is a driver issue and its absolutely ridiculous HP can’t support older models anymore.

Well sorry for the rant guys, just came across this post and wanted to put in my 2 cents. Good luck out there!

#40

Sorry to say we junked ours for parts in the end!