Charles asks:

> Is there a way to print output from the HP3000 to two logical devices, if
the
> user has specified a single device?  Or is there a way to send all out to
two
> logical devices concurrenly?

Yes.

The simplest situation would be if both of the printers were exceedingly dumb
and silent devices, guaranteed to absorb everything that came from the
spooler, as it appears, and never complain about anything. It is especially
possible if both printers are identical and serially connected, only as data
receivers. It's simply a matter of connecting both pins 3 (data receive) & 7
(ground) on the standard DB25 connectors of the two printers. Both printers
will then see the same data stream and react in the same manner, so long as
they each have paper and ink.

With a bit more work, pins 2 (the printers' transmit pins) of the two
printers can be connected together using diodes and a pull-up biasing
resistor. In this situation, if either printer calls for an XOFF, a paper
jam, or a paper outage, both printers will stop because both printers are
listening to exactly the same data flow -- and one of them asked the host to
kill the dataflow. This isn't necessarily bad. If one printer jams, both
stop. The only rub will occur with page level recovery; both printers will
obviously have to start from the same stop point.

All of this can only be done easily with a serial connection. Parallel
connections are still in the realm of possibility, but much more tedious to
put together. Network connected printers are simply out of the question,
unless you had some sort of intermediate network card that first converted
the dataflow to serial.

Wirt Atmar