Hey guys. LCD Smartie is absolutely awesome but I wish it was more reliable with my 44780 LCD's. Most of the time my LCD's do not activate. I have to keep closing and re-opening smartie to get it working. Sometimes it takes several attempts.
It's not WinXP because I just got a fresh install. It's not my parralel port because one is working off the mobo LPT and another off a PCI card. And it can't be the LCD's because I had them running fine a few years ago 2 computers back on an ISA dual parralel port. Yeah it's been a while since I used these, my new pci dual parralel port was not compatible with my previous computer's motherboard. Now I'm up and running but very infrequently. I swear to god though that installing port95 has made it worse but I have no clue how to uninstall the darn thing.
Any suggestions? I hate to keep re-opening Smartie and checking if it works .
How long are the cables between the LCD and ports? Some users here have had problems with long cables (like much more than 1m/3ft) that can be helped/solved by using a wider ribbon cable in which every other wire is grounded (so the signal wires aren't right next to each other), or using a shorter cable. Search for parallel port problems in the hardware forum section.
Unfortunately, I can't help with the port95nt driver... I use a serial connection.
.