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Problem with Ports
I want to get a scanner and some advertise a SCSI-2 card, does this work with parallel ports?, and I have several slots on the back of computer but they are all different sizes so I don't know what is what. I have a zip drive connected to the slot it fits into (it only fit into one) and a printer hooked to the zip. Can you please help clear up this confusion?
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Alternatively, you could buy a SCSI card and hook the scanner to that?
If you are going to buy a scanner, if it needs SCSI it will probably come with a SCSI card that fits into an ISA (the bigger slots) slot in your motherboard. The card will require an IRQ (interrupt number) and will more than likely be specific to your product (that is, it is unsupported for anyting other than the scanner). The IRQ requirement is the only thing that should interfere with a parallel port if the parallel port is used. If you have available IRQs that the card can use, you are fine. If you want, post the list of IRQs your machine is using and we can take a look. Ask if you want to know how.
There are scanners that connect through the parallel port. The bandwidth of the parallel port is very slow compared to SCSI, but these scanners will be less expensive. Generally, the output quality will be lower because the scanner will have to stop and back up more often while it waits for the data to be offloaded through the parallel cable. Also, there can be a color shift across the page caused by the bulb temperature change that occurs when a scan takes a long time.
USB scanners should perform fine. USB, although it is serial, is faster than parallel ports. This makes the USB ideal for devices like scanners and digital cameras.
A scanner on a serial port is just plane unacceptable as far as speed is concerned and should be avoided.
Hope this helps.
There are scanners that connect through the parallel port. The bandwidth of the parallel port is very slow compared to SCSI, but these scanners will be less expensive. Generally, the output quality will be lower because the scanner will have to stop and back up more often while it waits for the data to be offloaded through the parallel cable. Also, there can be a color shift across the page caused by the bulb temperature change that occurs when a scan takes a long time.
USB scanners should perform fine. USB, although it is serial, is faster than parallel ports. This makes the USB ideal for devices like scanners and digital cameras.
A scanner on a serial port is just plane unacceptable as far as speed is concerned and should be avoided.
Hope this helps.
ASKER
So, a SCSI card will be benificial for a scanner? I saw one advertised that comes with the card but says that the computer doesn't have to be opened to use it, is this true?
Yes, there is a performance advantage is using SCSI, but you must remember the bottleneck when scanning is the speed of scanning not the interface itself. Its worth noting that once you have a SCSI card you can also attach other SCSI devices to it, such as fast hard disks, backup drives etc.. You will have to open your case to insert the SCSI card. But its pretty simple, as its just like any other card.