virtualbox.org

Hi,

I have been struggling with this for far too long, time to ask for some help.

I have windows 98 installed as a guest on ubuntu 12.04 running virtualbox 4.3.10r93012

I cannot get the win98 guest to find the parallel port. I have harvested an older machine that has a physical parallel port on the motherboard.

I have used:

VBoxManage modifyvm 98 --lptmode1 "/dev/parport0"
VBoxManage modifyvm 98 --lpt1 0x387 7

to enable the parallel port.

I have confirmed the settings changed in the 98.vbox file:

grep -1 LPT 98.vbox
<LPT>
<Port slot="0" enabled="true" IOBase="0x378" IRQ="7" path="/dev/parport0"/>
<Port slot="1" enabled="false" IOBase="0x378" IRQ="7"/>
</LPT>

I have removed the lp module, and made sure the following are enabled:

lsmod | grep -e parp -e ppd
ppdev 12849 0
parport_pc 32114 0
parport 40930 2 ppdev,parport_pc

I have configured udev such that:

crw-rw-rw- 1 root lp 99, 0 Apr 9 15:41 /dev/parport0

I have ensured that the ubuntu user is added to the lp group and the lpadmin group.

The bios on the host machine has an epp setting and ecp/nodma ecp/dma1 and ecp/dma3 in addition to ps/2 and AT settings. I have tried all of the epp and ecp settings.

In the guest I have installed an ECP printer port and regular printer port. I have configured both of them to use a range from 0378-037A.

I have read that on the guest I should also disable interrupts, but I cannot find a way to do that on win98.

I think that covers everything I have found on what to do to make the lpt port work. Have I missed something?

I'm not sure what "add ECP printer port" etc means. Does Win98 device manager find the LPT1 port when you tell it to search for new hardware?

Hi Mpack,

Thanks for your reply, and all the other helpful info you have put on these forums...

mpack wrote:I'm not sure what "add ECP printer port" etc means. Does Win98 device manager find the LPT1 port when you tell it to search for new hardware?

No, it does not autodetect it. When I choose to install a port manually, I am provided three choices: Communications port, ECP Printer Port, and Printer port. Then I set the correct address in the device manager and reboot, and it comes back with the yellow exclamation mark. properties say the devices cannot be deteced, drivers not installed, etc, error code 24. I can verify the driver files are in place, so I take this to mean the guest just doesn't see the port...

Any hints would be greatly appreciated

I think it's time to post a VM log file. You can find instructions here: Minimum information needed for assistance.