Someone took away my computer and put in a new motherboard, power supply, fan, and case. I kept the same hard drives. Now my scanner and printer have stopped working. I tried re-installing, but it hasn't worked. They're both parallel port connections, the scanner into the computer, and the printer goes into the back of the scanner. It just doesn't recognize that the scanner or printer are there. Can anyone help me? Are there settings somewhere that I need to change because of the new motherboard? I checked the BIOS settings, apparently they're set to what they're supposed to be. Is there somewhere else I should be changing settings? If possible, small words are appreciated... I've worn out my brain trying to fix this. I'm really hoping it's something simple... ;-)

Make sure that they're actually switched *on* in the BIOS. If it's an AT style board, you could always check that the back connectors are actually attached to the board... You'd be amazed! ;)

There are 3 different printer port types: SPP, EPP, and ECP. You select the type in your BIOS setup. Many scanners that use parallel port connections require the ECP setting for the printer port. This setting involves 2 way communication between the device and the printer. Check your scanner manual and see whether you need to use ECP or EPP. The SPP setting probably will not work with the scanner.

Do this... Boot your PC to a DOS prompt (F8 when Starting Win 95 comes up) and then do a DIR>prn. If nothing prints then the LPT port is bad or not enabled. Depending on the mo bo it could be that the ribbon cable going to the mo bo is not attached or not attached properly. Let us know the solution please...

Thanks for the suggestions thus far. I've got the BIOS settings set to what they are supposed to be, ECP +EEP, and the other settings I was told. I guess I'll try taking it apart and checking the connections... I'm a bit leery, as the computer is new and I hadn't done that yet. One thing... it will occasiionally print something when I try, if I try it through around 10 times. So the info is coming through sometimes, at least to the printer. But then, that means the info is also getting to the scanner, and going on through to the printer. This is very occasional however, I spent 3 hours to get to pages to print out. Off to check connections in ze computer.

One more thing I just discovered... if I hook up the printer directly to the computer, taking away the scanner, then it prints no problem. But I want to scan too, darn it!

bri when i first saw your post (before everyone's time had been wasted on a wild goosechase), i was going to suggest trying the printer on its own, but i thought that might insult your intelligence! your latest post means the bios, ports and connections etc are ok and you have the standard problem of devices getting difficult when you try to run them from the same port. the scanner's literature and maufacturer's website is bound to say something about this. have you tried the scanner with the printer (a)unplugged and (b) turned off - what happens when you do that?