How to Buy a Printer Cable

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Introduction/Summary

At one time, you could buy a "standard" PC or Mac printer cable. Changes in technology have put us in a lengthy transitionary period with a variety of printer ports and cables in current use.

Instructions

1. Buy an IEEE 1284-compatible, bi-directional parallel printer cable to use with any PC printer.

2. Buy a "generic" bi-directional parallel printer cable to use with any PC and an old printer.

3. Buy a "generic" parallel printer cable to use with any PC and an old dot-matrix printer.

4. Buy a serial cable to connect a Macintosh-compatible printer to a 6000, 7000, or 8000 series PowerPC or any older Macintosh.

5. Buy a shielded Series-A to Series-B USB cable to connect a printer with a Universal Serial Bus port to a PC that came with Windows 98 pre-installed.

6. Buy a shielded Series-A to Series-B USB cable to connect a Macintosh-compatible printer with a Universal Serial Bus port to an iMac or G3 or newer Macintosh.

Tips

1. IEEE 1284-compatible, bi-directional parallel printer cables are much faster than other parallel cables.

2. USB cables are faster than IEEE 1284-compatible, bi-directional parallel cables, and sometimes cheaper.

3. Late-1990s Hewlett-Packard printers often work with cheaper, slower cables, but the manufacturer correctly advises that can't be expected. Your old cable might work for simple jobs now and cause miscommunication problems in the future.

Warnings

1. Be skeptical of cables that claim to be considerably faster than others of the same type. Ask for a demo with the "faster" cable tried first.

2. Older Canon printers will only work with 6-foot cables.

3. Expect odd or occasional printing problems with longer runs of cable, especially if you are daisy-chaining parallel-port peripherals.

4. Expect inexplicable compatibility problems with USB printers, especially if the computer didn't ship with Windows 98.

5. USB is likely to be quickly superceded by USB2 or a fast or better technology.

6. No cable will work if your computer doesn't meet the system requirements of the printer.

Glossary

USB. Universal Serial Bus