A Computer for Mach3 & the Taig Mill CNC Conversion
Last updated on Thursday, May 16, 2013 06:07:30 AM Eastern US Time Zone

Mother Board, SSD, Mass Storage, Enclosure, Display Brackets, USB Hub, Cables, UPS

First, assembled a computer to handle the Mach3 Mill software, a 4-axes LPT1 interfaced stepper controller,
an LPT2 interfaced manual pulse generator (MPG) pendant, relay control box, CAD/CAM, & the Internet.

Mother Board

Intel 775 socket Asus μATX MB with LPT1 I/O, Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.2 GHz E4500 CPU & 2GB RAM.
This low-cost Asus P5VD2-VM SE motherboard has integrated graphics & high-fidelity audio.

The CPU is pin-less. Running XP Pro SP3 OS & attached to a wired LAN on a high-speed cable WAN.

The supplied Intel CPU fan has plenty of reserve cooling capacity for this application.
The
magenta colored connector is LPT1.


Pre-graphics card configuration with 2GB RAM, a 320 GB WDC SATA 3 Mb/s, 16 MB cache, 7200 RPM HDD,
 Apacer AE101 embedded card reader & a Viewsonic Optiquest Q91b, 19" LCD monitor.


Asus DRW-20B1LT LightScribe DVD R-W upgrade. SATA cables opened the area for better ventilation.
This deck has built-in auto-vibration reduction, optimal tuning strategy & an energy green engine.
This low-end
Jaton Video Card PX 8000 v2 was replaced by a Raedon 5570 graphics card.



Upgraded to a faster graphics card with an ATI Raedon HD 5570 graphics engine, PCIe (16x) & 1GB DDR3
memory. Added 2GB RAM. With four fans (CPU, graphics card, power supply, & chassis) this system runs
cool & quiet. Power meter measurements: 80W at idle (65W without the graphics card) & 110W peak on boot;
300W power supply. This computer was built specifically for & is dedicated to controlling the CNC Taig mill in
4 axes using Mach3 Mill & the CNC Lathe using Mach3 Turn. It also has plenty of power for other applications.


Back panel of the computer. LPT1 (left) is on the motherboard & LPT2 (far right) is a Lava PCI card.

The computer was upgraded. The configuration is: a Gigabyte G41M-ES2L motherboard with LPT1 I/O,
Intel
Core 2 Extreme x6800 2.93 GHz 1066 FSB CPU with Rosewill cooler, 4GB G.Skill 4-4-4-12 DDR2-800
RAM with heat sinks, & a Raedon HD5570 chipset PCIe (16x) video card with 1GB DDR3 onboard RAM.
Gigabyte MOBO uses solid capacitors. The network is running at either a Gigabit wired or n wireless.

Solid State Drive (SSD)

Upgraded to Window 7 (32-bit for the LPT drivers) & installed it on a Samsung 840 250GB SSD.
Before an upgrade, make sure you have your latest Mach3 mill & turn xml setup files, licenses for
Mach3, Newfangled, Gearotic Motion. Set MOBO LPT to EPP+ECP in the BIOS & verify addresses.
If Mach3 uses Brain Control (e.g., for an MPG2) they have to be reloaded & configured, as well.
All Brain Control routines are placed into the Brains folder located in the main Mach3 folder.

Performance gains using Win 7 & an SSD in place of XP & an HDD is nothing short of phenomenal
even though this particular MOBO only has SATA II (3Gbits/s). All four networked computers use
Win 7 & SSDs. The 4 extra HDDs (2TB) now reside in a Mediasonic 4-bay enclosure for backups.
Total network storage is 5.5TB . The venerable XP OS has been retired after years of ultra-stability.



Mass Storage

Mediasonic 4-bay Probox HF2-SU3S2; low-cost, compact, fast (non-RAID) external storage solution.



The HDDs were not easily plugging into the box so I opened the back, loosened the six PCB
screws, installed the drives & re-tightened. Now the drives plug & play into the box very smoothly.


In the BIOS, I turned-off the two RS232 serial ports & configured the two LPT ports to EPP+ECP.
LPT1 is on the motherboard (378h) & LPT2 is a PCI card (df00h). The Port #1 address
is standard but the Port #2 address can vary so examine the computer's devices menu.


Enclosure

This photo shows Mach3 Mill depicting the tool path for cutting a circular pocket.

This Core 2 Extreme x6800 (Conroe) CPU-based system easily generates 100K pulses/sec &
higher in Mach3. 25,000 pulses/s is fine for this application & does not burden either of the two CPUs.


This enclosure has a door in an extra effort to reduce swarf infiltration; it is effective.
The low-profile
μATX case was selected to optimize placement under the bench.


Added an LPT2 PCI card (DF00) to interface the manual pulse generator (MPG) pendant remote control.
 

Display Brackets

Wall-mounted bracket for the computer's 19" LCD monitor. The bracket allows  the display to move
vertically, pivot, rotate, & tilt. Removing 4 small screws allows the OEM base to be completely removed.


The 4.75" x 4.75" x ¼" plate attaches to the 4, pre-existing M4-0.7 threaded mounting holes.


Top monitor bracket pivot with locking ¼-20 knob.


A wall bracket holds the monitor completely off the bench.


I used a Microsoft wireless mouse as I liked the backward/forward page thumb buttons, wide-tilt scroll
wheel & ergonomic shape. Added a programmable HP wireless keyboard to further reduce clutter & it
allows me to completely remove them from the work area. I have the two USB receivers located above
 the bench top as they were having difficulty picking-up signals through the 3" thick granite surface plate.


Upgraded to a Logitech M510 mouse with a USB micro-receiver. This mouse has superior ergonomics
with comfortable overall shape & slightly protruding forward/backward switches that have tactile feedback.
A shallow indent in the area in between the side switches gives location info to the thumb. The LED is
invisible infrared light & the two AA batteries last years. It works on one battery if light weight is desired.
One micro-receiver can interface up to seven coupled Logitech devices.

USB Hub


Seven-port, externally powered USB 2.0 hub (D-Link DUB-H7) with two, high-current charging ports (Taiwan).


Bench-mounted the hub using an aluminum plate screwed to the backstop & attached with double-sided tape.


Installed Logitech Z-4 speakers which included a subwoofer. The Z-4 has a decent price to performance ratio.
All of the components of the install emphasized lowered bench clutter & the mitigation of metal swarf effects.


The monitor bracket has since been lowered as I wear bifocals for close viewing.

Cables

The CPU, LCD, opto-isolation, safety charge pump, & pendant interfaces are protected by a computer monitored (RS232)
APC uninterruptable power supply while the stepper motor control circuit is protected by a standard APC surge protector.

UPS

Uninterruptible Power System (UPS).
An upgraded APC Back-UPS ES 550 having computer monitoring software connected via a USB.

Mother Board, SSD, Mass Storage, Enclosure, Display Brackets, USB Hub, Cables, UPS

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