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Adapting the BIOS settings

The manual of the SuSE 7.2 recommends, that setting your parallel port to EPP mode is always a good idea (even if you do not intend to use a scanner) and the documentation of the Plustek driver says similar things. Therefore it will surely not hurt to set your parallel port to this mode or to take at least a look to make sure it is set to this mode already.

The mode of the parallel port has to be set in the BIOS of your computer. To enter the BIOS setup of your computer, you will have to reboot and at the appropriate moment of the boot process press a special key on your keyboard, more often than not it will be the Del-key. You should see an according message shortly on your screen right after the memory test. If you pressed the key on time, you will get into the BIOS setup. (You might consult the manual of your motherboard for more details about BIOS setup and favorable BIOS settings.)

You should be able to find the parallel port setup in one of the probably many menus of your BIOS setup. There should be some form of menu describing the mode the parallel port is set to. In my BIOS one of four options has to be selected:

Set it to EPP. This should be it. You can then leave the BIOS setup again. The parallel port mode shouldn't be a problem after that. Also you might find, that writing down all your BIOS settings on a sheet of paper seems like a bit of a daunting exercise, but it could be useful: Sooner or later the battery on your motherboard might fail and erase all your BIOS settings. Then a sheet of paper with all the right settings taped to the side of your tower might prove valuable indeed. (Since it happened to me I know it can happen :->) But for now setting the parallel port to EPP mode should be enough.


next up previous
Next: Does my parallel port Up: Preparing the parallel port Previous: Preparing the parallel port
Johannes Prix
2003-06-12