Very new: will I be able to communicate with this controller board?

tommylight wrote: Wait, that box has "parallel port" written on the back !
Find a PC with a parallel port, connect it, run Linuxcnc stepconfig and find the pinout, use the machine !
It should be as simple as that!

Don't get your hopes up. The listing says USB and the OP said USB and there is no USB to be seen. I suspect the photo is not for the actual product listed.

You never know, often those machines simply come with a knock off copy of a UC100 USB-parallel port adapter for their USB connector. But until you actually have the thing in hand you can never be sure what you are going to get.

this is at that price for shure a GBRL clone
andi ti designed to run direct on CAM like estlcam freeCAD K40
i dont think you can run this on a real Controller software without investing at least 10USD for a 5Axis breakoutboard

As Todd said, there are several of them on this forum, one was here lately, same usb to parallel converter.
Ditch the converter, get a 3$ cable, run Linuxcnc, make chips.
Then again, maybe this one is different.

So, questions for the OP:

1) Is there actually a parallel port on the control box?
2) Is there a USB to DB25 cable as part of the kit, with a slightly fat connector at the DB25 end?
3) If you pull the top off the controller, do individual wires run from the DB25 to 3 x identical stepper drives, or does there seem to be an intermediate layer?

There is a fair chance you can ditch the USB-parallel and use either an actual parallel port on a PC (as old-fashioned as that might seem) or use one of the PCI or ethernet-connected Mesa cards with a DB25 output.

But whatever choice you make, it you are using LinuxCNC then the USB cable can't be used.

The good news is that if you are a Python programmer then it is easy to send G-code commands direct to LinuxCNC from Python
linuxcnc.org/docs/2.7/html/config/python-interface.html

you also can use a general universal g-code sneder to get g-code to the controller mainstorige