PCI-E Parallel Card Problem

Hello,

I'm literally new to Linux (i started using it soon as the CNC Router arrived in the company i work for) so we were using an computer with integrated parallel port and it worked fine until the computer died.

We bought a new computer for the CNC but then i realised that the Mother Board doesn't have a parallel port, to deal with this problem i managed to get one of those PCI-E Parallel Cards. Then began my problems and days of headache, it turns out that my knowledge about linux it's not enough to make it recognize the card, so i'm here to ask for a help to you guys.

I'm using Ubuntu 10.04 LTS,

Here's some pics of the board:

Since i don't know nothing about linux system and all i know is how to open a terminal window, be patient with me please.

Thanks all you guys for taking your time! Sorry about my english, it's not my native language.

Here's what LSPCI, PSCI +x and LSMOD Shows:

andypugh wrote:

It _could_ be the "serial controller". You could try 1C00 as the base address of the parallel port in the HAL file and see what happens.

Like this? if yes it didn't worked

i would use
lspci -v >pcidevs.txt
and post pcidevs.txt here

the -v option is more readable, looking like this:

00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801IR/IO/IH (ICH9R/DO/DH) 4 port SATA Controller [IDE mode] (rev 02) (prog-if 8a [Master SecP PriP])
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device 2818
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
I/O ports at 01f0
I/O ports at 03f4
I/O ports at 0170
I/O ports at 0374
I/O ports at 11f0
I/O ports at 1200
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: ata_piix

Also is there some reason you are using the Lucid (10.04) distribution
instead of the current LinuxCNC distribution? (Debian Wheezy)

Newer hardware (like PCIE parallel port cards) may not be supported by 10.04

PCW wrote:

i would use
lspci -v >pcidevs.txt
and post pcidevs.txt here

the -v option is more readable, looking like this:

00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801IR/IO/IH (ICH9R/DO/DH) 4 port SATA Controller [IDE mode] (rev 02) (prog-if 8a [Master SecP PriP])
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device 2818
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
I/O ports at 01f0
I/O ports at 03f4
I/O ports at 0170
I/O ports at 0374
I/O ports at 11f0
I/O ports at 1200
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: ata_piix

Also is there some reason you are using the Lucid (10.04) distribution
instead of the current LinuxCNC distribution? (Debian Wheezy)

Newer hardware (like PCIE parallel port cards) may not be supported by 10.04

datakanji@datakanji-desktop:~$ lspci -v
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 4 Series Chipset DRAM Controller (rev 03)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: agpgart-intel
Kernel modules: intel-agp

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 27
Memory at fe400000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
I/O ports at dc00
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: i915
Kernel modules: i915

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family High Definition Audio Controller (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 16
Memory at fe9f8000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel

00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family PCI Express Port 1 (rev 01)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=01, subordinate=01, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00001000-00001fff
Memory behind bridge: c0000000-c01fffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000c0200000-00000000c03fffff
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
Kernel modules: shpchp

00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family PCI Express Port 2 (rev 01)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=02, subordinate=02, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 0000e000-0000efff
Memory behind bridge: fea00000-feafffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000fdf00000-00000000fdffffff
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
Kernel modules: shpchp

00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family PCI Express Port 3 (rev 01)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=03, subordinate=03, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00002000-00002fff
Memory behind bridge: feb00000-febfffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000c0400000-00000000c05fffff
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
Kernel modules: shpchp

00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation N10/ICH7 Family USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 23
I/O ports at d880
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd

00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 19
I/O ports at d800
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd

00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 18
I/O ports at d480
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd

00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 16
I/O ports at d400
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd

00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 01) (prog-if 20)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 23
Memory at fe9f7c00 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=1K]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd

00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev e1) (prog-if 01)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=04, subordinate=04, sec-latency=32
Capabilities: <access denied>

00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801GB/GR (ICH7 Family) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel modules: iTCO_wdt, intel-rng

00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation N10/ICH7 Family SATA IDE Controller (rev 01) (prog-if 8f [Master SecP SecO PriP PriO])
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 19
I/O ports at d080
I/O ports at d000
I/O ports at cc00
I/O ports at c880
I/O ports at c800
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: ata_piix

00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation N10/ICH 7 Family SMBus Controller (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 043e
Flags: medium devsel, IRQ 15
I/O ports at 0400
Kernel modules: i2c-i801

02:00.0 Serial controller: Device 1c00:3250 (rev 10) (prog-if 05)
Subsystem: Device 1c00:3250
Flags: fast devsel, IRQ 17
I/O ports at e800
Memory at fdff8000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=32K]
I/O ports at ec00
Expansion ROM at feaf0000 [disabled] [size=32K]
Capabilities: <access denied>

03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM57788 Gigabit Ethernet PCIe (rev 01)
Subsystem: Dell Device 0438
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 28
Memory at febf0000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: tg3
Kernel modules: tg3

The distributor of the CNC sent me a copy of a cd with this system, but i guess it only needs linuxcnc to work.

OK, looks like 0xE800 or 0xEC00 are good addresses to try

andypugh wrote:

You shouldn't need to go back to Stepconf (and, in fact, you probably shouldn't).
If you have a working config it is generally better to make a copy of the config folder and edit the HAL and INI files directly.

It is possible that you might have to do something in the BIOS to activate the card, though that is just an idea.

Are you positive that the motherboard doesn't have a parallel port header on the board?

Do you have any other PCIe cards that you can try in that slot to see if they get detected?

Sorry, i didn't really knew how to change it so i went back to Stepconf,

I've tried to check for the card in BIOS but looks like the BIOS is locked or something like that, and i can't find anything about it in there.

unfortunately i don't have any other pci-e card to test it,

but in fact i did other test in Windows 7, installing the driver that comes with it, and surprise, it shows in Device Manager 1 Parallel Port and 2 Serials like it should be.