Vinyl Cutter

[Fedallah]

Not sure where to post this question, or if I should even post it on this site. A friend of mine bought a vinyl cutter (used to make signs and decals) on ebay. The cutter comes with sign making software. The software list system requirements of; "Pentium 4, 512mb ram, 40gb hard drive space, cd rom, serial or usb port."
His computer is a HP A1310N, with an AMD Athlon 64 3700+ 2.2ghz proc, 1gb ram, 200gb hard drive (computer is brand new still PLENTY of room), and a DVD-Rom.
The software installs fine, and he's able to create designs with it. However, when he tries to send the design to the cutter the program stops responding, and locks up.
ANY suggestions?
I wouldn't think that a 2.2ghz Athlon 64 would be unable to run a program, while a Pentium 4 could, but I might not be thinking of something. Only issue I can think of is that it's a store bought PC, and there is too many startup programs running-using too much of the processors resources.

[Kov-Ice]

What connection type is being used? If Serial, are there any resource conflicts? Maybe try insatlling the hardware with the other connection type.

[edfair]

Some of the cutter programs used a lock device as a piracy deterrent. This was a parallel port device that the software company supplied, without it the software locks up. Went into the the parallel line if that was the cutter cable interface or standalone if using other interfaces.
Ran across it in a similar situation. Software company used it to extract another license fee when the cutter was sold.
Software manual should have the details buried somewhere inside if they use the method.

[Panama Red]

What edfair is referring to is called a "dongle" and he is 100% correct about needing one with some software. I just built a system for a sign maker who uses a vinyl plotter/printer and the dongle was needed to make it interface correctly.

[Fedallah]

Hmmm...
Interesting. I'll have to look into the "dongle". Its not mine so I have to contact the owner. The cutter uses a serial port, but since his computer doesn't have one; he's using a Belkin serial to usb adapter cable, which is what the cutter's directions say to do. Don't know if that would make a difference. If the serial to usb is a problem, could I use a serial to parallel adapter?

[Panama Red]

Might be easier to just use one of these. No more adapters.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16815104258

[Fedallah]

Thanx for the help everyone.
I got it to work, my friend had the wrong output port selected.