Back in the 90s me and some of my classmates made a 3 fingers robot hand with 3 stepper motors controlled with a intel 386 PC, via two parallel ports. We used darlington transistors instead of a motor controller shield. The programing was made in turbo Pascal. I was our graduation project :)

I think that this uses more current in a day than my pi in an entire year

The Algorithm Gods guided me here, looks like you've received their blessing.

This EXACTLY the kind of stuff I love. Repurposing all the old junk I have lying around that I’m always looking to use. Thanks so much my man!

A PC's printer port is pretty resilient but make it a habit to use a resistor for each LED to limit the current that goes through it. Not only makes sure you printer port lives long but also your LEDs. Also having all the LEDS on at the same time and all of them using current even with the resistors can damage the printerport. On motherboards this printerport is often integrated in one of the big chips and you don't want to blow that one up. Probably your keyboard/mouse will also stop working, maybe even more. Best solution is to use a 'buffer' chip like a 74HCT541 and lookup the source capacity of the pins in the datasheet. Often it is around 30ma for each pin, but also about 150ma for all pins combined. At least when you do something wrong you blow up this buffer chip (a few cents) and not a part on your motherboard (10's of dollars or even difficult to replace). So have fun, but don't forget the basic I=E/R (current is voltage divided by resistance.) :)

This is a cool thing to do with an old PC. I was doing this back in the 90s on my production machine and it taught me a lot about using computers to control mechanical processes.

Somehow in my recommended with only 1.8k views in a year! Nice video!

As a computer engineer. 9:47 is my life style...

Great video, thanks for the nostalgia. Two suggestions: 1) Use the TIMER variable. It counts milliseconds. In GW-BASIC: 1000 REM Delay - can be down as low as hundredths of a second 1010 CURR = TIMER 1020 IF TIMER < CURR + DELAY THEN 1020 2) Use the power rails on your breadboard. You could put the LEDs in to the breadboard with the cathodes (shorter leads) in the blue (negative) rail, and that would save you all of those jumper wires going over to the right side of your breadboard. It would also be a bit safer to use 360 ohm resistors in series with each LED; those could go across the trough for each column of the breadboard that has an LED.

I did this exact thing in 1987 to control X-Y tables used in production in a laser machining lab. We upgraded to a Centent CN0170 after some issues with repeatability and speed ramping. Within its limitations, it was cheap, effective and versatile.

This is great. Showing how we can utilize old tech for many different purposes and an understanding of the technology behind it all.

I never even thought of this. I used to do this sort of tinkering when I was back in the DOS days. Qbasic was my first programming language. This is a great place to start for the beginner.

If you connected all the led's to the -ve rail on the breadboard you could have saved heaps of wires and some time as it would have put those legs in parallel.

"Happy Easter", and thank you very much for your support and time 😉 I learned something from your video 😎

Man, just got it in my notifications. This is exactly my setup when I first time started programing. Qbasic, on very old laptop without even soundcard in late 90s. It was so much fun. Funny thing is that the whole IDE and space for programs was just single floppy. Nice video!

I just acquired an old pc that fits this description perfectly. I would really like to see a lot more project specific tutorials, so I can choose one to best fit my interest.

this is so retro, Qbasic makes me remember back in those day I learn pascal in hs

👍🏻 QBasic - reminds me my first playing with programming back in around 1993. Minus the electronics. That might have been some extra fun but only my brother appreciated back then.

Some great info here! I'm a LONG time, original QuickBASIC fan. Today I learned about FreeDOS and a good use of the parallel port. Well done! I have thumbs-up and subscribed!

Watching this made all kinds of lights turn on in my head! Far out - good stuff!

LOVE IT !!!!! I grew up with old XTs, then later learning DOS at University doing Mechanical Engineering and using GW Basic and then Fortran about the time that 486DX4’s first came out. The Computer Lab at Uni had 386s for student use and the mainframe was a DEC10. Massive in physical size!!!! My first hard drive had a 20 Mb capacity!!!!!!!

I have liked this decision, but it have large size and low energy efficiency for system of automation. But I think, this idea is great for teaching. Great work!

What a genius behind the scene. I like what I've learned, thank you

You got my sub when I saw Pete's QBSite.... This took me back to my childhood lol. Awesome video man

I thought about it but didn't know it is possible! Awesome video!

Back before we had access to DACs, I remember toggling the cassette relay on a BBC Microcomputer at different rates to achieve a basic form of PWM to make music with different toggle frequencies. LOL.

absolutely amazing. I can't believe I've only just found this. This is such a fun project.

This is exactly how I did my microcontroller projects 20 years ago. I am SO glad Arduino came along.

If you'd used a DB25 connector, you could have kept the cable intact. I used to use a similar method to control relays from the parallel port and did temperature sampling using some 1-wire sensors and a PIC via the serial port.

there is a python library for parallel port programming called pyparallel.

I'd forgotten the old parallel port. I used it to control a speech chip for my final year project way back when I was a student. Really enjoyed your video. Who cares about their electric bill when you can have this much fun.

Awesome video! I’m totally dusting off one of my old pcs and sacrificing a serial cable to the serial cable gods! Thanks!

Мы с друзьями такими вещами баловались в 1990-х годах, только без подключения внешних устройств... Отличное видео, дружище!

way back when pcs had the horrific ISA slots you could get proto slot cards. i remember maplin electronics sold an isa projects book that worked using qbasis. if i remember correctly yoy can also use some of the parralell pins to up the anti to bi-directional transmission. so you have input and output.. i think maplin also did an RS232 projects book.

i found a new life for that (those'(2)) motherboards, i had a lot of fun programming the USER port on my C64 and getting to use QBasic, gwbasic was a new learning curve, now you've upped my interest in this idea, i use my old boards again . .....cheers and a big thank you, Arduino can sit on the side for little bit

Thanks for all the comments that guides your primitive way to use things in a right way, the world is full of good, polite and informative people ❤️. A pattern in this video reminds me of StyroPyro channel or something like that.

Yes, there was an 'automation/control something' life before Arduino was invented ... and todays 'Makers' were even born... ^_^ .... older people (tm) like myself know and fondly remember these times... thanks for this vid!

Interesting... reminds me of where I left off with the Zenith and Packard Bell's we had. Then tried to keep the stalkers away, though only bought the books, played a little video game work and just work as much as I can mind. Bought em those first years in college era, though still have em to read... Programming the Parallel Port: Interfacing the PC for Data Acquisition and Process Control and Parallel Port Complete are around somewhere where the later is the OG on the bounce back, albeit brief while I was still in school and not haunted by a fearless remote sensing stations concealed wireless assault weapon operations operator idiot that wanted to be in that house.

Great informative video man, the coded beeping sequencer works a charm and the power of the arduino!

Just came across this video Man. you are genius I love you English is not my first language and yet I (think I) understood some of your nuances

1:07 REALLY wanted you to jump-cut to the motherboard starting to boot with the screwdriver still lying on it, and just continue the video as though nothing strange had happened.

Instead of cutting the db-25 cable you could have plugged it into a breakout board and had labeled screw terminals ready to go

Qbasic was the shit back in HS. though we didn't do any electronic work with it, cheers for the video!

Very Nicely done, bro!

Instead of wiring all the cathodes of the LEDs in parallel you could have used the power rail of your breadboard. Also LEDs need resistors in series...

the LPT programming tutorial I needed in 1993

Really good video, your channel deserves more views

I remember doing this with a Commodore 64 in 1984. I actually used it to control an RC truck with software. My son loved it.

I used QuickBasic back when it first came out (1990) to program Star Trek games and mess a bit with databases. This video isn't much of a functional "wow" thing, but it's pretty interesting in a historical and educational sense. Now if you actually had QuickBasic(and not just QBasic) you could compile your code into an .exe file and that stepper motor would be hauling some serious butt. Cool video! (Edit - I'm assuming that you may not have the full QuickBasic, but if that's what you're using, give the compiling a try)

Back in the 80's hobbyists used the joystick ports on their Atari and C64 to do this. If I knew then what I know now, I could have built much cooler stuff.

this is exactly what I was looking for :)

This takes me back to the 80's early 90's. Many hours tinkering with LED's and the printer port. The bit I was happy with (in 90's) was with my Amstrad CPC 64, (upgraded to 128k, woop woop!!), peeking and poking into games and the like. And the other, an Amstrad PCW, 256k memory, was my hero PC when self employed back then. Today though, much so easier with Arduino / Raspberry PI, but still enjoyable.

its better to write in c or c++ and use linux to control the i/o.Much faster that basic

back then, we used a simple loop to check how fast the processor was: TIMER ON ON TIMER(1) GOSUB exitcpuspeed DO speed# = speed# + 1 LOOP exitcpuspeed: TIMER OFF that gives us a number of how many do-loops your computer does in one second. then you can use that loop to create a finer resolved timer: DO dummy# = dummy# + 1 LOOP UNTIL dummy# > (speed# / 10) that gives you just a little bit over 0.1 second delay - because you put a few cpu cycles extra for the comparison into the delayloop

One of the best videos of KZfaq

I like your presentation. not every expert is good in teaching and sharing. good job

5:46 The 6th LED doesn't light up. It looks like a screwdriver or something must have fell on the computer. It couldn't be a rock, that would caused 2 LED's to go out.

Forget the Arduino and Pi, use your old PC and get your electricitybill exploding! xD Anyway cool Idea.

THis is so old technology I almost forgot about it. Nice refresher

I love that idea! I will try it!

Fantastic video! Glad to see someone keeping it real with discrete components, rather than some off-the-shelf Arduino garbage! As for the delay issue, instead of the annoying "beep" statements , you might try setting a variable to some low integer value, such as "Del = 10", then replace each beep command with "For X = 1 to Del: Next X". That way, you get good control over the speed (not to mention peace and quite), just by changing the value of the "Del" variable. Thanks for the terrific vid - I look forward to seeing more of your fine handiwork! Cheers!

excellent! only a little recomendation: when soldering to male pins like that, insert a female strip first (or a breadboard), so the plasticdoesn't bend. Make sure to not insert them all the way in or the female part could melt

Nice sense of humor and content!! You got a new subscriber :)

Awesome idea ! Thanks for the content ! And praise the algorithm gods !

comments are hilarious, people crying over a free cable (since they are no longer needed), over the electricity bill (while air cond or heating is ON), comparing PC with arduino... :)

I use Tinycore on a thumb drive and use C to do the same thing. I still like basic.

You have just gained a new subscriber ! Can you FEEL your youtuber powers augmenting !?

So useful. Brilliant. Thanks for posting.

Get a MCP2221 USB-GPIO/I2C/UART, connect to a PC USB port, done.

yes, instead of 4W use 220W, that's genius.

I wish I would have learned this when I was a kid. Basic is the perfect language to teach programming to beginners. The sintax is simple yet robust enough to do many complex applications. Thanks for the video.

I like your thinking. Never understood the PI concept and I have ARM devices from the 90s running on 2 AA batteries. I played with a printer back then and the serial port is fun as well.

yes, i will definitely be fitting a full size ATX motherboard into a plant moisture logger :-(

A LED must always be driven by current, so it *needs* resistors. They are not lightbulbs.

Oh yes, I remember this Basic shell. As a kid I had fun times. Abd yes, controlling LEDs was part of that fun.

I used this features 30 years ago. In the bios you can see the direction of parallel port ie 378 2F8 or so one. You can also comunicate with serial port, similar to arduino's uart, but at different voltage levels.

Looking good, BUT: microcontroller (like Arduino for example) gives you GPIO's and more: ADC's, I2C, SPI, interrupt pins and more, which is not available on parallel port. Without deeper view (schematic maybe) of your mainboard you won't have a possibility to play with more advanced topics. Blinking LEDs, yes, but how long would you be happy with it? More useful project for this PC would be to install some linux and learn something then. And in current prices and availability of cheap prototype boards (Not only Arduino, try STM Nucleo series or TI Stellaris launchpad) this may be just a kind of day or two days project.

LinuxCNC is based on this concept.

thats how we did the things 25 years ago. Old school way! Thanks for remember us that!!!

Qbasic and DOS I started with. Nice to see those things can be used today. Well you can try with C too. :)

I mean, the point of a micro controller is the MICRO bit. THIS is not micro. Edit: I'm not trying to sound rude, it's cool as hell but it kinda defeats the purpose lol.

Why didn't you use a version of linux instead of DOS?

this is so cool. i love to experiment with electronics but some of the components are either unavailable or too expensive to buy. this video might help people with limited resources like me. keep it up!!

For some reason this video was suggested for me, and I'm glad! I appreciate this is an old(ish) video but still worth commenting on. As others have said, use a buffer or logic IC when interfacing a parallel port as that was how it was designed. It is also possible to use serial ports to achieve the same thing, but it's more complex electronically. Watching this reminds me of a parallel port project I bought years ago that had eight relays in it and you turned the relays on by sending the appropriate characters to it. It was simple to control in that even a DOS batch file could 'print' a control character to it. In this way it was possible to have DIY peripherals turn on or off when a certain program was started with a batch file. The main point of all this is that it was so SIMPLE to interface to a PC in those days! The parallel port is very simple, as is the serial port, and data can be sent from the command line without ANY drivers needing to be loaded. The USB port, by comparison, is an absolute nightmare because so much is required just to do the simplest thing. If you want to try and interface directly then, basically, forget it! If you don't mind using third-party ready-made electronics then there are USB-to-Parallel and USB-to-Serial interfaces that may help provided you can sort the appropriate drivers out for these interfaces. The old parallel and serial ports may be more complex electrically and not even provide any power but they are simple to use in software, whereas USB is the opposite in that it is (relatively) simple electrically but far more complex software-wise. Fortunately, the are a few add-in cards that will proved serial or parallel ports properly, as well as a few modern motherboards that have a serial port on them (even if it is just a header for a wired port).

So much waste of computational power though. Throw a lightweight linux distro into the pc and make it a fully functional computer. Arduinos' are pretty cheap. It is not worth doing it except for educational and experiment purpose.

I used to use Turbo CNC in conjunctuon with s parallel port to control a 3 axis CNC machine back in the day... ut worked very well and all i used for a driver were IRLZ44 mosfets straight off the port pins

Bro good job! Really cool

Man, u blown my mind!, Genius!

Nice. That's how I started connecting electronics to computers. My pride back then was creating a text display with only eight leds by scanning through a matrix of "1" and "0" (yes, strings. didn't know better then^^) and moving the parallel cable with the leds really fast. Always dreamed of converting an old printer into a scanner but never got that far until quite suddenly the knowledge increased past that point and I knew I could do that but it didn't seem interesting enough anymore.

Popped into my recommended. I used to use my PC to control projects I built years ago. You can use the serial port if you have feedback you want the computer to use. It was great fun. Nowadays I'll use ESP32's and relays to control stuff in my house.

Ahhhh beautifull times! QBasic and parallel port experiments :) I remember my laser transmission based on this ;)

This very useful. Thanks!

Excellent video!!

Huh, this video popped up after i was looking for info on system speaker. I had this idea of using PC as a microcontroller, glad to see it in action. There's so much potential in this, no uC can get even close to a system with OS installed

Loved your idea and video, when covid appeared i started wondering if that was possible, just to get fun. Of course there's much better suited equipment, but sometimes, you just don't have it. Thanks for making the video.

Great video, thank you

This brings me back :)

Nice video! I did similar around the turn of the millennium. I used the box (486 computer) and Visual Basic 4 DOS. The syntax is very similar to FreeDos. Since I didn't have the printer cable anymore, I got me an RS232 plug and soldered wires on it. To protect the printer port, I used TTL NAND chip 7400. I gave up since using the Arduino is more convenient.

this basically addresses something I was always wondering about and now I know its doable. I always thought couldn't the pc just output signals but not by way of a microcontroller but just directly off some pins somehow? This says yes!

Nice Video which uncovers the basics of computing- what MS Windows is disguising. BTW, I bought me a 25pole plug for the parallel port. Further I am using Visual Basic for DOS to have a graphical interface (coding is like QB). When you need inputs (4 are possible) you have to dig deeper into the parallel port programming. For an analog input you make it like in Apple2, you use a 555 and measure the time on an digital input (I never tested it).