Thinking of moving from Mach3 to Linuxcnc

I've been working on my own Mach3 plasma system and external torch height controller which will communicate with Mach3 via Modbus. Will also add in a remote pendant using Modbus.

However, I'm seeing the gradual demise of Mach3 in the future. You need XP and an old (= unreliable) parallel port PC. I've heard Mach doesn't work too good on modern PCs, so even if you can get a parallel port card, that may not be a long term solution.

This is what I can do with Mach3 and my main question is can Linuxcnc do the same:

1. Screen customisation - adding DROs, buttons, LEDs. I've heard this is a lot of work in Linuxcnc, true ? In Mach I can use images to enhance the appearance of the various elements.
2. Scripting - Mach uses Cypress Enable (Basic) to write macros/scripts which you can use for all sorts. For example, I can create whatever DRO, buttons, etc I want then use macros to read DRO values, save them to a "profile" file, etc. Then I use another button with a macro attached to display a dialog box on the screen with a list of all the profile files. I choose one of these profile files, press the OK button, and the DROs are updated with all the parameters.
3. Modbus serial communication - certain parameters in the DROs are then passed to the torch height control, while at the same time Mach is reading parameters from the external torch height control and remote pendant, and using those parameters to say update other DROs.

Also does Linuxcnc use more modern PCs. I'm noticing the recommended (for Mach) Pentium 4 PCs are getting harder to find and that is going to get worse with time. I know Linuxcnc uses Mesa cards, but do you ALSO need a parallel port computer, or can the Mesa cards take their place.

Cheers,

Keith.

Building custom guis is difficult if you are unfamiliar with computer programing (or are unwilling to learn).

Linuxcnc does work well on some modern hardware. But the hardware needs to be able to provide adequate latency. A good example of hardware that doesn't work would be a typical laptop that is so burdened by hardware interups because of all the power saving features. It is a little bit of a crap shoot picking out a board, but it is mainly dependent on the motherboards design.

Linuxcnc isn't dependent on the parallel port, but it is a convenient and cheap means for real time i/o for software access. Other options like many cards from Mesa, have the added benefit of adding hardware counters, and step generation making them vastly superior to the lowly parallel port.

Thanks Todd,

ha ha, all I ever seem to be doing is learning stuff. I'm one of those guys who gets irritated with people who just say, "Can you do this for me, I don't know how", instead of asking, "Where can I find information on learning this".

Perhaps I've just had my very first taste of computer programming with VBA style dialog boxes and file creating, opening, etc. Prior to that I've learnt a bit of C for programming Arduino, a quite useful tool. So what type of computer programming is needed for Linuxcnc gui customisation ?

Mach3 was also a bit of try it and see regarding PCs. For example the last one I tried had perfect specs yet gave a bad driver test. Other less powerful PCs have had much better stability.

Keith.

Beefy Beefy Beefy we have go to stop meeting like this

Just do it,

Thanks John & Thanks Andy (some good links are always welcome).

That screen at the bottom of the Gscreen page looks just like something made in Mach3. Ha ha, a bit of a closer look and I see the words Mach3 at the top. That must be the base image they used. Not sure if I'm into the old wood paneling mind you

It certainly is a whole new ball game going to Linux from Windows, plus I'm finding the info on Lcnc seems to be much harder to find. I don't think this transition will happen overnight.

Hi Willy, I think the cnc plasma world is fairly small so we'll probably bump into each other in various places. Pity we didn't live near each other. You live where I originally intended to go when I came to Australia (I'm a pom, hope you don't mind LOL).

Keith

That Gscreen sample is an image from Mach3 - it's not included because i imagine the image is not open source.
If you know of a screen image that is open source please let me know.
The problem with using image files for the main background is it requires the screen to be a certain size.
resizing moves the buttons around.

using gladevcp/gscreen (or gmoccapy) for a screen is easier then trying to modify AXIS but still requires
a fair investment if you want something very different.
If it;s just a few buttons and suck then it is pretty easy.


Chris M

Thanks Chris,

that's interesting about the background and the buttons, etc not being "locked" to each other. I don't think that happens in Mach so I would have wrongly assumed it would be the same in Lcnc. Wish there was a decent graphical screen designer for Lcnc, I'd happily pay for it.

Regarding open source images for screensets, what about the free ones being offered for Mach. See this page:

www.machsupport.com/software/downloads-updates/screensets/

I'm sure if there's any licensing requirements for any of them it will be mentioned in the downloaded material. You can just go into the bitmaps folder in the downloaded screenset and look at all the images with a picture viewer.

I'm sure a Google of Mach3 screensets may come up with some additional ones.

Hope that's of some use.

Keith