HP 82143A Printer Self test?

[Kostas Kritsilas]

Hello,

A sort of newbie back asking more questions.

I am not new to HP calculators (mostly know the red LED Classics, and the HP-41s), but I recently bought an assortment of HP-41 (and one HP-67) related items, one of which is the 82143A printer (the one that plugs directly into a HP-41 port). Does anybody know if it has a built-in self test? Something that would output the character set, or a pattern of some sort? My 82240B IR orinter does, so I am wondering if the 82143A does as well. I did read the printer manual, and there is no mention of it.

Kostas

[AndiGer]

AFAIK it doesn't have. The only way to get characters printed is to plug to a HP-41 (which should be off if something is plugged in or out as with all port extension gadgets) and press Print on the printer or to issue a print command from the calculator (with the printer attached and on PRX, PRA resp.)

[Diego Diaz]

Hi Kostas,

The HP-82143A printer does not have a built-in self test.

There is however a "Printer Service Module": ET-11968 that you can use to test your printer (provided you have a CL, any Clonix/NoV module or MLDL2000).

The ROM file (PRTSRVC.ROM) can be found at Monte's 41CL site.

Details on the testing procedure are described in the Printer Service Manual; available in another well known HP-41 devoted site.

Hope you find this useful.

Best regards.

Diego.

[Kostas Kritsilas]

Diego,

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I tried the printer by connecting it to one of my HP-41CXs, and it printed. The printout looks fine, it is clear and the contrast does change when I move the slider, and the paper advances smoothly. I just wanted to print out the full character set to make sure everything is 100%.

I don't have any of those modules, nor do I have a CL. But I do know where to find the Printer Service Manual, so I will go get it from there.

[Kostas Kritsilas]

Just for completeness, picture of a couple of short printouts. i am guessing the thermal paper is of the type that prints out in blue.

[vassilisprevelakis]

Hi Kostas,

Is your problem related to the paper advance, causing some lines to overwrite the previous ones.

If this is so, then its not something that a diagnostic program will help you with. Its just that the O-rings that push the paper have deformed with age (having stayed in the same position for ages).

So my advice is to advance the paper a little bit every day, so that the O-rings have a chance to get back to their original round shape. If you see improvement after a week, keep doing it till the paper advances consistently. Then be sure to print something about once a month every month to keep the O-rings in shape.

**vp

[Kostas Kritsilas]

You are probably right about the paper rollers. I will do as you suggest and advance the paper every day.

The printer basically works, which is what I established with the printouts. I just wanted the diagnostic program to print out the entire character set to see that there were no issues with any of the characters, like I can with the 82240B. I'm pretty sure I am going to be doing any printing with my 82240B anyway, and that printer will be more useful if I ever get any of the Swiss Micros calculators.

[Thomas Okken]

You can print the entire character set using a simple program like this:

Code:

 01◆LBL "CHARS"
 02 .11216
 03 STO 00
 04◆LBL 00
 05 .015
 06 STO 01
 07◆LBL 01
 08 RCL 00
 09 RCL 01
 10 +
 11 ACCHR
 12 ISG 01
 13 GTO 01
 14 PRBUF
 15 ISG 00
 16 GTO 00
 17 END

The output should look like this:

Code:

◆ˣ⨱←αβΓ↓Δσ◆λμ∡τΦ
ΘΩδȦȧÄäÖöÜüᴁæ≠£▒
 !"#$%&'()*+,-./
0123456789:;<=>?
@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNO
PQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_
`abcdefghijklmno
pqrstuvwxyzπ|→∑⊢

[Kostas Kritsilas]

Thanks for taking the time to write up the program. I can't seem to get it working so that it prints out the character set. No matter, it did help me get more comfortable with my HP-41CX, and learn how to use the HP-41CX, and the usefulness of the "Trace" mode on the printer.

I would attempt to troubleshoot the program, but I'm still in the early part of the HP-41CX manuals, so it will be a while. It does seem to be entered correctly, and the trace function on the printer seems to indicate correct operation, from what I know of the HP-41CX at this point.

[Thomas Okken]

You should see the program perform ACCHR with 0, 1, 2, ..., 127 in the X register, ignoring the fractional part. ACCHR accumulates a single character in the printer's buffer. PRBUF is performed after every 16th character, printing the contents of the buffer and clearing it, to cause the output to be formatted in lines of 16 characters each.

In TRACE mode, you should see it print each character immediately after performing ACCHR, because in that mode, the buffer is flushed after every instruction. Running the program in MAN mode should result in the print-out looking like in my first post.

Flag 21 must be set in order for this to work, but that should be the case automatically since it is set when the calculator is turned on, as long as the 82143A is connected.