30 Nov
2007
30 Nov
'07
4:53 p.m.
My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he owns a Amstrad PCW 8256
and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go
anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know
of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of
anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can
buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate
through email in english.
thank you,
Steve Martin
1 Dec
1 Dec
3:51 a.m.
On Fri, 2007-11-30 at 16:53 -0800, Steven Martin wrote:
My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he owns a
Amstrad PCW 8256
and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go
anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know
of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of
anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can
buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate
through email in english.
Considering the machines were made mostly in the UK and Germany, you
should be OK on that score.
Is the head itself free to move? I seem to recall something about buffer
chips failing in the printers that caused various odd problems -
erroneous "Bail Bar Back" messages and stuff.
Maybe you should check on eBay and see if you can pick up the
serial/parallel adaptor for it, and hang a "normal" printer off it. You
could also squirt the documents across the serial port to a newer
computer. If you do this, make sure you get one with the right
connector - German PCWs had a different plug to GB ones iirc.
Gordon
7:42 a.m.
On 01/12/2007, Steven Martin <speedracer005 at mac.com> wrote:
My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he owns a
Amstrad PCW 8256
and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go
anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know
of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of
anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can
buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate
through email in english.
It's a British machine, so English shouldn't be a problem.
They're still quite common over here, but international freight for a
printer isn't worth it. The bundled printer is dumb, with no
controller electronics; all the logic is in the computer.
The PCW8xxx has no serial or parallel ports - you'd need to buy them.
If you can find an interface, that's a good option.
Other option: get LocoScript PC, have his disks batch converted, and
give him a dead basic PC with DOS, a 3.5" floppy drive, and set up
MS-DOS to boot straight into LocoScript. It has a huge range of
printer drivers so you'll get something that can drive a modern inkjet
or an old-fashioned mono laser fairly easily. Obviously, with DOS,
you'll need parallel-port printers.
Locomotive, the company that wrote LocoScript for the PCW (and indeed
the PC version, the BASIC and DOSes for all the Amstrad 8-bit
machines, their CP/M ports, Mallard BASIC for CP/M and the graphical
BASIC/2 for DR GEM) is still around. They'll be able to help you.
http://www.locoscript.com/
--
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2:21 p.m.
On 01/12/2007, Steven Martin <speedracer005 at mac.com> wrote:
I should have the service manual for it somewhere. It's an Amstrad
manual, so just schematics and parts lists, but that's all you really need...
My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he
owns a Amstrad PCW 8256
and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go
anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know
of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of
anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can
buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate
through email in english.
It's a British machine, so English shouldn't be a problem.
They're still quite common over here, but international freight for a
printer isn't worth it. The bundled printer is dumb, with no
controller electronics; all the logic is in the computer.
Tjhere's a little PCB in the printer. It contains, from waht I remember,
the driver transsitors, etc. The printer is controlled (again IIRC), by
aprogrammed 8042 microcontroller on the main PCB.
The fault could be any number of things, most of them fixable (dry
joints, blown driver transsitors, etc). A defective 8042 could be a
problem, oyu'd have to take a spare from a similar machine, as I suspect
oriignals are long since unavailable.
-tony
7:15 p.m.
> On 01/12/2007, Steven Martin <speedracer005 at
mac.com> wrote:
> > My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he owns a Amstrad PCW 8256
> > and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go
> > anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know
> > of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of
> > anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can
> > buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate
> > through email in english.
I'm amazed that your father still can find 3" CF diskettes for the
thing and that his diskette drive hasn't developed "belt slop" yet.
At any rate, there's a somewhat fuzzy service manual for the Joyce
and its printer at http://www.amstradcg.nl/service.pdf . It might be
readable enough to get you going.
My guess as far as culprits, if the carriage motor hasn't gone south
and the right signals are getting through to the printer, would be
IC706 (HA13408) or Q701 (2SA1013) labeled "carriage enable" on the
schematic.
Cheers,
Chuck
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