XP Pro and hardware compatibility

[David]

Hello.

I have XP Pro and will be installing it soon. I have 3
obsolete devices and I'd like to find out if there is a
way to make them work. 1) a HP 680C printer...there are
no XP drivers available for this printer, but I understand
that many users have gotten old printers to work in XP by
using a generic driver. Does anyone know if I can do this
for my printer? 2) I have an old MS gamepad and MS Force
Feedback Pro joystick. XP does not recognize them by
itself, but I was told be a MS game technician that he
was "almost" certain both devices could be added through
the gaming properties. Does anyone know if that will
work? 3) I currently use 98SE and use ICS to connect a
home network to the Internet. Specifically, I have an
internal NIC (connects to the Internet) and have a USB NIC
to connect to my HUB. The USB NIC is a 3Com 3C19250. I
called 3Com and they said no XP drivers were available. I
did some googling and found out that there are people out
there who have written XP compatible drivers for this
device and claimed to have gotten it to work. I tried
contacting the respective writters, but the email links
were broken. Does anyone know if there is an acceptable
work around for this? The USB NIC is only 1ms slower than
an internal NIC and I hate to go buy a new NIC just for
the sake of buying a new one.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

David

[Alvin A Brown]

Hello

Most printers you can use a win2000 driver and that will work in somes
cases ok. Below you will see a few more links to help you ok.

http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/default.asp
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q316639
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q307726

Alvin


David wrote:

> Hello.
>
> I have XP Pro and will be installing it soon. I have 3
> obsolete devices and I'd like to find out if there is a
> way to make them work. 1) a HP 680C printer...there are
> no XP drivers available for this printer, but I understand
> that many users have gotten old printers to work in XP by
> using a generic driver. Does anyone know if I can do this
> for my printer? 2) I have an old MS gamepad and MS Force
> Feedback Pro joystick. XP does not recognize them by
> itself, but I was told be a MS game technician that he
> was "almost" certain both devices could be added through
> the gaming properties. Does anyone know if that will
> work? 3) I currently use 98SE and use ICS to connect a
> home network to the Internet. Specifically, I have an
> internal NIC (connects to the Internet) and have a USB NIC
> to connect to my HUB. The USB NIC is a 3Com 3C19250. I
> called 3Com and they said no XP drivers were available. I
> did some googling and found out that there are people out
> there who have written XP compatible drivers for this
> device and claimed to have gotten it to work. I tried
> contacting the respective writters, but the email links
> were broken. Does anyone know if there is an acceptable
> work around for this? The USB NIC is only 1ms slower than
> an internal NIC and I hate to go buy a new NIC just for
> the sake of buying a new one.
>
> Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
>
> David

[David]

Hello.

Thanks for those links...actually, I was aware of them
already...I'm still curious whether anyone knows anything
else about what I've asked...perhaps one of the MVP folks
could comment.

David
>-----Original Message-----
>Hello
>
>Most printers you can use a win2000 driver and that will
work in somes
>cases ok. Below you will see a few more links to help you
ok.
>
>http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/
default.asp
>http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-
us;Q316639
>http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-
us;Q307726
>
>Alvin
>
>
>David wrote:
>
>> Hello.
>>
>> I have XP Pro and will be installing it soon. I have 3
>> obsolete devices and I'd like to find out if there is a
>> way to make them work. 1) a HP 680C printer...there are
>> no XP drivers available for this printer, but I
understand
>> that many users have gotten old printers to work in XP
by
>> using a generic driver. Does anyone know if I can do
this
>> for my printer? 2) I have an old MS gamepad and MS
Force
>> Feedback Pro joystick. XP does not recognize them by
>> itself, but I was told be a MS game technician that he
>> was "almost" certain both devices could be added through
>> the gaming properties. Does anyone know if that will
>> work? 3) I currently use 98SE and use ICS to connect a
>> home network to the Internet. Specifically, I have an
>> internal NIC (connects to the Internet) and have a USB
NIC
>> to connect to my HUB. The USB NIC is a 3Com 3C19250. I
>> called 3Com and they said no XP drivers were
available. I
>> did some googling and found out that there are people
out
>> there who have written XP compatible drivers for this
>> device and claimed to have gotten it to work. I tried
>> contacting the respective writters, but the email links
>> were broken. Does anyone know if there is an acceptable
>> work around for this? The USB NIC is only 1ms slower
than
>> an internal NIC and I hate to go buy a new NIC just for
>> the sake of buying a new one.
>>
>> Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!
>>
>> David
>
>.
>