CAD program dongle vs. Acer laptop

[TeGGeR®]

X-posted to:
comp.sys.laptops
alt.comp.hardware
microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware,


Greetings,

I've been given a brand-new AMD-based Acer 5044WLMi laptop with WinXP. My
work requires that I use a certain DOS-based CAD program which uses a
dongle attached to LPT1. This dongle is seen properly by the same CAD
program running under WinXP on a Pentium-based desktop where the
motherboard has a built-in parallel port.

The laptop has no parallel port, but must be given one through a PCMCIA
parallel card. These are not cheap. We purchased a Quatech SPP-100. It
works just great, but the CAD program refuses to see the dongle no matter
how we tweak the settings in WinXP. (In fairness, the vendor did say there
was no guarantee the SPP-100 would work the way we needed.)

I know WinXP prohibits direct access to the hardware, something parallel-
port dongles seem to need, but that does not seem to be the problem here.
The CAD program makers refuse to support this version of the program any
more; they want eveybody to upgrade. We are, therefore, on our own.

I'd be very grateful for any ideas before we go buying any more PCMCIA
cards.

 

[Richard Urban]

You are either going to have to update your CAD program or install it (the
DOS version) on a dedicated "older" computer and maintain that computer for
your CAD program. Windows 98se would seem like a good choice here.

--

Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User
(For email, remove the obvious from my address)

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

 

[budgie]

X-posted to:
comp.sys.laptops
alt.comp.hardware
microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware,


Greetings,

I've been given a brand-new AMD-based Acer 5044WLMi laptop with WinXP. My
work requires that I use a certain DOS-based CAD program which uses a
dongle attached to LPT1. This dongle is seen properly by the same CAD
program running under WinXP on a Pentium-based desktop where the
motherboard has a built-in parallel port.

The laptop has no parallel port, but must be given one through a PCMCIA
parallel card. These are not cheap. We purchased a Quatech SPP-100. It
works just great, but the CAD program refuses to see the dongle no matter
how we tweak the settings in WinXP. (In fairness, the vendor did say there
was no guarantee the SPP-100 would work the way we needed.)

I know WinXP prohibits direct access to the hardware, something parallel-
port dongles seem to need, but that does not seem to be the problem here.
The CAD program makers refuse to support this version of the program any
more; they want eveybody to upgrade. We are, therefore, on our own.

I'd be very grateful for any ideas before we go buying any more PCMCIA
cards.

I think you are going to have to upgrade the software or downgrade the machine.

The way that LPT-connected pass-through dongles work is that the software sends
information to the port without strobing, and the dongle responds when a key
byte sequence is seen. This is why they (in theory at least) don't interfere
with through traffic to the printer or other downstream device such as a
scanner.

Whether a PCMCIA card is capable of supporting this same functionality is
doubtful, as it would really be expecting the "normal" sequence of:
..load_data_port
..strobe
..wait_for_ack
..load_next_byte etc
and I'd be prepared to bet that any other port-replacements (eg using USB or
Firewire) would be spectacularly unsuccessful.

 

[zwsdotcom]

work requires that I use a certain DOS-based CAD program which uses a
dongle attached to LPT1. This dongle is seen properly by the same CAD

If you are not in the United States (where DMCA prevents fair use of
the type I'm about to describe) then your best, and only long-term
solution, is to find a crack for the program in question. I have a
similar situation with a compiler at an old workplace.

Moral for impressionable souls reading this thread: Don't allow your
proprietary data to be locked up in someone else's copy protection.

 

[zwsdotcom]

work requires that I use a certain DOS-based CAD program which uses a
dongle attached to LPT1. This dongle is seen properly by the same CAD

If you are not in the United States (where DMCA prevents fair use of
the type I'm about to describe) then your best, and only long-term
solution, is to find a crack for the program in question. I have a
similar situation with a compiler at an old workplace.

Moral for impressionable souls reading this thread: Don't allow your
proprietary data to be locked up in someone else's copy protection.

 

[SMS]

The laptop has no parallel port, but must be given one through a PCMCIA
parallel card. These are not cheap. We purchased a Quatech SPP-100.

Hmm, I' ve used the SPP-100 on programs where I was almost sure that it
wouldn't work and it did (http://www.macraigor.com/raven.htm). Yep, they
cost around $100. I bought a laptop with a parallel and serial ports
specifically because I knew that I'd need to use other programs that
require direct access.

You did make sure that you had the SPP-100 set to standard mode, with
EPP not enabled?

It also could be that the Quatech isn't providing a high enough voltage
on the pins to power the dongle. Remember, the dongle draws power from
signal pins, not a very kosher thing to do. I've seen this problem with
the Rainbow brand parallel port dongles with certain parallel port
chips. The parallel port manufacturer often uses the minimum voltage
specified by IEEE 1284 (2.4V) in order to reduce EMI, and the dongles
don't like this, even though the parallel port meets spec. You might try
measuring a logic high on one of the parallel port control lines and on
one of the data lines. If it's 3.0V or so, then you should be okay. If
it's the minimum (2.4V) then that may be the problem, and it might be
worthwhile to try a different brand of PCMCIA card, preferably the
oldest one you can find, and PCMCIA, not CardBus (or whatever
terminology you like to use)!

The other problem I saw with dongles is when the parallel port chip
tri-states the outputs between bytes. The way the dongle works is that
the software is using one of the eight data lines as a strobe, and the
other seven lines for data, but never uses the strobe. This is why
pass-through works on dongles, the printer never sees the data sent to
the dongle, because the strobe is never toggled. The dongles don't like
the data lines to be tri-stated, though there is really nothing illegal
about tri-stating them when the port isn't in use.

Look at "http://www.transdigital.net/info.htm". They do offer a
money-back guarantee.

 

[CBFalconer]

.... snip ...

The other problem I saw with dongles is when the parallel port chip
tri-states the outputs between bytes. The way the dongle works is that
the software is using one of the eight data lines as a strobe, and the
other seven lines for data, but never uses the strobe. This is why
pass-through works on dongles, the printer never sees the data sent to
the dongle, because the strobe is never toggled. The dongles don't like
the data lines to be tri-stated, though there is really nothing illegal
about tri-stating them when the port isn't in use.

If that is the problem why not add pull-up resistors to the port
output lines, with an external supply (maybe 3 AA cells). About
4.7 k per line should do, for roughly 5ma max per line battery
drain. It can all be implemented in a small box.

 

[TeGGeR®]

Hmm, I' ve used the SPP-100 on programs where I was almost sure that
it wouldn't work and it did (http://www.macraigor.com/raven.htm). Yep,
they cost around $100. I bought a laptop with a parallel and serial
ports specifically because I knew that I'd need to use other programs
that require direct access.

All the ones available to me had no serial or parallel ports.

You did make sure that you had the SPP-100 set to standard mode, with
EPP not enabled?

There's no setting in Device Manager that would allow me to do this. I
tried changing all the options available except the I/O range.

Look at "http://www.transdigital.net/info.htm". They do offer a
money-back guarantee.

I've emailed them, thanks for the link.

I also found this place: http://www.safe-key.com/
They have a utility on their Web site that will read the data on the
key. I have run that utility and sent them the data file. According to
Safe-Key's tech support, the dongle in question is highly sensitive to
timing.

Thanks to all for their help. Hopefully this will get resolved
successfully.

 

[SMS]

If that is the problem why not add pull-up resistors to the port
output lines, with an external supply (maybe 3 AA cells). About
4.7 k per line should do, for roughly 5ma max per line battery
drain. It can all be implemented in a small box.

On 1284 compliant ports, there should already be pull-ups. The instance
of this problem was with some weird SuperIO from some low-end Taiwanese
semiconductor company. You didn't see many in the U.S. except on no-name
motherboards because they didn't have a license to use the 16550 UART,

 

[SMS]

I also found this place: http://www.safe-key.com/
They have a utility on their Web site that will read the data on the
key. I have run that utility and sent them the data file. According to
Safe-Key's tech support, the dongle in question is highly sensitive to
timing.

Which brand of dongle is it?

 

[SMS]

All the ones available to me had no serial or parallel ports.

Yeah, it's tough. There are very few that still have the parallel port,
though quite a few still have serial ports. The Fujitsu E8110 is the
only one I could find with a parallel port. I have seen some white box
notebooks with parallel ports. IBM has a drive bay adapter for serial
and parallel ports on a couple of models.

 

[TeGGeR®]

Which brand of dongle is it?

Sorry, I should have said that at the beginning.

It's called "Activator".

The case has a picture of a porcupine molded into it above the word
"Activator (tm)". It dates from roughly the mid-late '90s.

 

[TeGGeR®]

Yeah, it's tough. There are very few that still have the parallel
port, though quite a few still have serial ports. The Fujitsu E8110 is
the only one I could find with a parallel port. I have seen some white
box notebooks with parallel ports. IBM has a drive bay adapter for
serial and parallel ports on a couple of models.

I'm stuck with what I've got now, unfortunately. Other than the CAD
program problem, the laptop is really nice and I like it.

My CAD program tends to operate a bit choppily on machines with Intel
processors, which describes most laptops. The AMD processor on this
laptop allows the program to run smoothly, like it does in Win98. That's
a primary reason this Acer was chosen.

The Safe-Key place emailed back asking for a copy of the CAD program
(which I provided). They have the lock's data. Apparently they can work
up a software solution for $350 US. I've asked them for a guarantee of
success before I go any further.

The place you referenced hasn't emailed me back yet.

 

[Grinder]

X-posted to:
comp.sys.laptops
alt.comp.hardware
microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware,


Greetings,

I've been given a brand-new AMD-based Acer 5044WLMi laptop with WinXP. My
work requires that I use a certain DOS-based CAD program which uses a
dongle attached to LPT1. This dongle is seen properly by the same CAD
program running under WinXP on a Pentium-based desktop where the
motherboard has a built-in parallel port.

The laptop has no parallel port, but must be given one through a PCMCIA
parallel card. These are not cheap. We purchased a Quatech SPP-100. It
works just great, but the CAD program refuses to see the dongle no matter
how we tweak the settings in WinXP. (In fairness, the vendor did say there
was no guarantee the SPP-100 would work the way we needed.)

I know WinXP prohibits direct access to the hardware, something parallel-
port dongles seem to need, but that does not seem to be the problem here.
The CAD program makers refuse to support this version of the program any
more; they want eveybody to upgrade. We are, therefore, on our own.

I'd be very grateful for any ideas before we go buying any more PCMCIA
cards.

I was involved in a similar situation involving a dongle-protected
compiler. In our case, our only resolution came in a fortunate
programming accident that hacked the dongle checks out of the code.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

Well I guess that's one way to solve it!

 

[CBFalconer]

Yeah, it's tough. There are very few that still have the parallel
port, though quite a few still have serial ports. The Fujitsu E8110
is the only one I could find with a parallel port. I have seen some
white box notebooks with parallel ports. IBM has a drive bay adapter
for serial and parallel ports on a couple of models.

The IBM T30 Thinkpad is available certified used at IBM.com for
about $500. It has both serial and parallel ports.

 

[SMS]

My CAD program tends to operate a bit choppily on machines with Intel
processors, which describes most laptops. The AMD processor on this
laptop allows the program to run smoothly, like it does in Win98. That's
a primary reason this Acer was chosen.

The Safe-Key place emailed back asking for a copy of the CAD program
(which I provided). They have the lock's data. Apparently they can work
up a software solution for $350 US. I've asked them for a guarantee of
success before I go any further.

It may be that the SPP-100 won't work because of the CardBus controller
in the notebook, or because XP doesn't allow direct writing to the
hardware, not because of any incompatibility with the parallel port. So
the Safe-Key is probably a better approach.

On older notebooks with 16 bit PCMCIA slots, you might have had a better
chance of it working, as the PCMCIA slot was essentially a buffered ISA
slot.

Other things to try would be running Windows 98SE, if drivers are
available for all the devices in the notebook. You could install a boot
loader such as Grub, and choose between 98SE and XP, but then you'd need
a FAT32 partition on the drive.

The copy protection crap is enough to drive you crazy, and ironically
it's the legal owner that has to put up with all of it, the person
stealing the software has hacked the copy protection.

I know a lot of people have stuck with the older versions of OrCad
because the later versions require a dongle, a network connection at all
times. The network connection is fine when you're in the office, but
when you're on an airplane it's a pain.

 

[TeGGeR®]

It may be that the SPP-100 won't work because of the CardBus
controller in the notebook, or because XP doesn't allow direct writing
to the hardware, not because of any incompatibility with the parallel
port. So the Safe-Key is probably a better approach.

They tell me they've got a guaranteed solution. I cross their palms with
silver and my troubles are over.

On older notebooks with 16 bit PCMCIA slots, you might have had a
better chance of it working, as the PCMCIA slot was essentially a
buffered ISA slot.

That's interesting. I didn't know that.

Other things to try would be running Windows 98SE, if drivers are
available for all the devices in the notebook.

I tried just that, testing it by temporarily installing a spare HD I
had, and installing Win98 on that. Win98 would only run in Safe Mode, so
there is clearly a driver conflicting or missing. I finally decided this
would be more trouble than it was worth.

You could install a
boot loader such as Grub, and choose between 98SE and XP, but then
you'd need a FAT32 partition on the drive.

The copy protection crap is enough to drive you crazy, and ironically
it's the legal owner that has to put up with all of it, the person
stealing the software has hacked the copy protection.

Well, the manufacturer refuses to support the older version, and wants
nearly ten grand for the new one, so...

 

[TeGGeR®]

TeGGeR® wrote:


I was involved in a similar situation involving a dongle-protected
compiler. In our case, our only resolution came in a fortunate
programming accident that hacked the dongle checks out of the code.

And that appears to be the final fix in this case as well.

 

[TeGGeR®]

I was involved in a similar situation involving a dongle-protected
compiler. In our case, our only resolution came in a fortunate
programming accident that hacked the dongle checks out of the code.

Just received the fix from Safe-Key. It works! No key required any more!