Firstly, thank you so much for your interest and help.
As I understand it Visual Cadd itself puts out a standard plotter language control. As I mentioned I never had to install drivers on any of the computers to run the plotter. It appears that’s the same for the current version, the manual says:
Quote
Using Direct Plotting
If you have an older vector output device such as a pen plotter, you can use Visual CADD™'s direct
plotting features to enhance control over the device. By using direct plot, you bypass the Windows print
drivers and send information directly to the plotter. Direct plot allows you to use plotters that do not have a Windows driver.
Unquote
My plotter is a Roland GRX300-AD.
It does have a self test program inbuilt and it runs it just fine.
I started computer drafting back late 1970’s with Pink software in London, Went on to Generic Cadd and then when we came to Canada found Visual Cadd. I used it for the odd house renovation and designing furniture. Beyond the simple work I was doing I’m afraid I wasn’t interested in the technical aspects. As in writing with a pen I got really frustrated with having to redraw every time I wanted to modify something. I have the manual for the plotter but the serial port settings blow my simple mind so I have always used the parallel port.
I am on the Visual Cadd forum but my query went unanswered as most of the people on there are professional drafters/designers, use up to date plotters and are way up the tech scale from me!
The USB/parallel port adapter I tried is “Ugreen.” The computer says it recognizes the adapter but it won’t show a parallel port for outputs, only USBs. The visual Cadd plotting function doesn’t work without a LPT1 or LPT2 to send to.
The print functions work just fine but of course my printer is only 8x10. I too love watching the plotter put out a plan!