I'm not quite sure which would be the best forum to post the USB question, but I'll try here.

I've got Windows XP Home on a P4 2.2 system and have been having nightmares with my printers. I'm using a HP870Cse and an Okidata ML184 dox matrix. I also have a Brother MFC8500 all in one machine on the system via USB. I know it may sound nuts, but all three of these printers are used many times each day.

I found somewhere on the MS site a statement that Windows 2000 does not use the Windows 95/98 method of addressing the parallel ports, and as such there can be problems printing through those ports. My experience with XP Home is that 100% of my processor capacity is taken up while printing through my parallel ports (2 on the computer). I'm guessing that the same issue of port access that exists in 2000 has been put in XP Home. I can do virtually nothing else on the computer until the printing is completed.

I've resolved this issue by purchasing parallel to USB adaptor cables. When printing via the USB port I have nearly no cpu capacity being used after the first moment of two of printing, and I can proceed to my next task on the computer while it is printing.

HOWEVER, it seems that the USB addresses change at random when I boot up my computer. I have numerous Excel macros that automatically print (invoices, quote forms etc.) for me. The various USB ports show up in those macros as Ne03, Ne04, Ne07 etc. I'm not sure where in XP to find what those assignments are so I just auto-create a macro that prints and then edit the macro to see what the Ne## assignment is. My problem is that XP is randomly changing those assignments (at boot up I assume). As such my macros fail and I have to figure out what the Ne## assignment is again and again.

Anyone know enought about USB port addressing to enlighten me on this issue?????

Thanks,
BH Davis

did you set the bios "Reset Configuration Data" option?