Questions About LaserWriter Select 360

In a pinch an Apple Printer-8 cable can be used to connect the LaserWriter Select 360 to a Mac with a round serial port. But you still need to turn on AppleTalk, as it is an AppleTalk connection.

The preferred method is to buy two or more farallon PhoneNet boxes and two "phone-jack mounted terminating resistors" and a four conductor telephone lead-in cord. Assemble the pieces in the obvious way and plug the empty holes with the terminators. These parts are available for cheap money on ebay -- about five bucks should buy a handful.

Turn on AppleTalk.

Open the Chooser. If the printer is present and you connected properly, when you select LaserWriter driver in the left box, the printer's name will appear in under a quarter minute in the right box.

The number of pages printed prints on the Startup Page, if it has not been disabled. If it has been disabled, the solution to either read out the page count or turn the startup page back on again is to run Apple Printer Utility.

If you need a copy of the Laserwriter utility software to access the startup page, check my profile and email me. We still use those printers regularly.

Jim

Very often that cable is all you need.

But not always. Sometimes, the cable does not work and you have to revert to the PhoneNet boxes. I have never seen a suggestion about why it sometimes does not work. But I have seen folks who tried it, it did not work, and they went to the PhoneNet boxes and it all worked great.

You MUST remember to turn on AppleTalk on the port you are using for the Printer. Failure to do that will mean you will never find the Printer. Turning on AppleTalk adds the AppleTalk/LocalTalk protocol, and boosts the speed from about 9,600 bits/second to about 240,000 bits/second.

The LaserWriter Chooser Extension should already be on your Mac, unless you have removed it or disabled it with Extensions Manager.

AppleTalk is always Installed, you cannot remove it.

This eBay auction features a pair of PhoneNet boxes:

eBay category: Computers and Networking: 2 Apple Mac PowerUser PhoneNet Network Adapters

The left phone jack of the left box has the "Phone-jack mounted terminating resistor" inserted in it. It appears there is one in the box on the right as well. This auction include two phone cords, more than you need.

There is a small article on Wikipedia, with links to a photograph and a links to a copy of the PhoneNet Installation Handbook.

Message was edited by: Grant Bennet-Alder