The Sinclair QL Forum

Hello,

I was lucky enough to get an original Sinclair QL branded printer with a recent lot of stuff the other day. I popped a new ink thingy in and some paper and held the button to tell it to print the standard test page - which it did, effortlessly (forgot how slow and loud these things are!).

Encouraged by that, I then connected it to my current active QL (It has Minerva and a Trump/Floppy etc Tetroid device). The printer came with a lead already plugged in to it and as my QL is a German one, the lead on the printer (which was also used in Germany originally) plugged straight in to the back.

When I input the basic program from the printer manual that OPENs #3,ser etc - It prints random characters, different ones each time I run it.

I'm a bit too young to remember what to do in these sort of situations and have zero old-printer experience! Can anyone offer some guidance?

Thanks.

I sorted it!

Had to change the printer baud rate (with the dip switches on the back) to 9600. It was originally on 1200. Prints nicely now.

Printer printing, but with garbled characters, is a pretty sure sign you've connected it to the proper port, but are running it at the wrong baud rate.
You could try and decode your printer's DIP switches with the help of your manual to find the proper baud rate, but easier (albeit not quite so tree-friendly) is trial-and error: The most common baud rates can be set by

BAUD 1200
BAUD 4800
BAUD 9600
BAUD 19200

One of these (try printing after having used BAUD) should make it work - Then add this line to your BOOT file and you're Bob's nephew.

Tobias

My first guess would be that it is serial speed mismatch between the printer and the QL
Check the printer settings - and also the QL baud rate.

Thanks for those replies. As you can see, I came to the same conclusion and sorted it, probably while you were both writing. The original QL Printer seems quite scarce. Anyone else got one tucked away?