HP 4ml with USB adapter

[StillWorks]

I have an old 4ml which generally works flawlessly. But, to hook it up to my new computer which has no parallel port, I bought a parallel to USB cable. Now the printer prints intermittantly. 70% of the time the printer control panel for the HP shows error in the status section. The newest driver fromt he HP website is installed. This is all the info I can think to give, I hope someone can help.

 

[ski]

What is the text of the error message?

 

[ngxGraz]

I hate to break it to you, but it's not even worth keeping the printer. Printers are getting to be super cheap, and they work much better on usb

 

[StillWorks]

I will check on the text. I don't think there is any. That's the frustrating part of the print control panel. It only says "error"

I'd rather not throw away a printer that will just sit on a trash dump on Staten Island. It works perfectly. If nothin else, I'll use it for my laptop which has a parellel port. I know that we're trained to treat everything as disposable but I can't get myself to subsribe to that.

The printer does work sometimes when connected to the USB port. So I feel as though something can be done to make it consistent...maybe not.

 

[BionicJohn]

I did a simlar thing with an ancient Canon BubbleJet, but it worked fine.

ISTC recall there was a driver or some software to create or modify the port. It became soemthing like "USB_1 (Prolific Technology Inc. IEEE-12)"

I don't know if that's helpful or not.

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[G0AOZ]

Ok, so you want to retain your old printer, and be environmentally friendly! Next time someone offers you an old PC running anything from XP down to Windows v3.11, press it in to service as a print server. Network your main PC, your laptop and the newly formed print server PC, and Hey Presto! you can print from either computer to your old HP.

ROGER - G0AOZ.