Welcome

Connecting Your Printer

Most printers are Centronics-compatible and connect to a parallel port. However, a printer can also be connected to a serial port. You can have more than one printer connected, but you can print to only one at a time. Use the Printer Preferences editor to switch between parallel and serial printing. This is described on page 9-8. If you need to do a serial connection, you must also use the Serial Preferences editor, described in Chapter 5, to configure the interface.

Follow the instructions in your printer's documentation for using the proper printer cable. Connect it to the appropriate port on the Amiga according to the Amiga hardware manual.

If you have more than one printer connected to your Amiga or you have a printer connected to a port other than the standard serial or parallel ports, see "Connecting Multiple Devices" below. When using an expansion device that offers additional serial and/or parallel ports, the device's documentation should explain how to connect these ports.

Connecting Printer Output Devices

The standard Amiga printer output device is PRT:, which sends its input to the currently selected printer drive. You can bypass the Amiga printer driver by redirecting output to PAR: or SER:, which sends the output directly to the parallel or serial port, respectively, without any alteration. This is useful, for example, if you need to send a raw PostScript file to a PostScript printer attached to either port.

Connecting Multiple Devices

It is possible to use both a parallel and a serial printer with your Amiga system. You can also use more than one parallel or serial printer by using an expansion device that offers additional serial and/or parallel ports. On such systems, you must use the Printer Preferences editor to select which output device to use. On systems with additional ports, the device's documentation should give the unit number assignments for each port in your system. You then can use the Unit options of the Printer and Serial Preferences editors to specify the correct printer. The following table contains instructions for switching between printers on systems with more than one.

System Configuration

Switching to a Different Printer

Standard ports only with one serial and one parallel printer

In the Printer Preferences editor, switch the Printer Port gadget between Serial and Parallel. Change serial settings in the Serial Preferences editor if necessary.

Additional parallel ports and more than one parallel printer

Enable the Printer Preferences editor's UNIT Tool Type, then enter the parallel port number for the desired printer in the Device Unit gadget in the Printer Preferences editor.

Additional serial ports and more than one serial printer

Enable the Printer Preferences editor's UNIT Tool Type, then enter the serial port number for the desired printer in the Device Unit gadget in the Printer Preferences editor. Change serial settings in the Serial Preferences editor if necessary.

System Configuration	Switching to a Different Printer
Standard ports only with one serial and one parallel printer	In the Printer Preferences editor, switch the Printer Port gadget between Serial and Parallel. Change serial settings in the Serial Preferences editor if necessary.
Additional parallel ports and more than one parallel printer	Enable the Printer Preferences editor's UNIT Tool Type, then enter the parallel port number for the desired printer in the Device Unit gadget in the Printer Preferences editor.
Additional serial ports and more than one serial printer	Enable the Printer Preferences editor's UNIT Tool Type, then enter the serial port number for the desired printer in the Device Unit gadget in the Printer Preferences editor. Change serial settings in the Serial Preferences editor if necessary.

For more information on the UNIT Tool Type, see the descriptions of the Printer Preferences editor in this chapter and the Serial Preferences editor in Chapter 5.