OVER 2 YOU 220 (01/03/05)

AMIGA PRINTER

An elderly friend of mine uses the Amiga 1200 (no USB, no Windows and no wish to convert) and his printer has gone totally u/s. The printer is an Epsom Stylus Colour 740, Model P110A and must be 8 to 10 years old. Current printers only seem to work with Windows or Apple and are USB connected anyway. Can anyone help locating the above model of printer or suggest a printer that is compatible with the Amiga 1200.

Bill Noise, via email

I've been using Amigas for ten years and upgraded from a dot-matrix printer to an Epson C62. I use a third party printing program called "Turboprint", which prints Photo quality pictures, see: www.irseesoft.de/default.htm. If Bill’s friend doesn't want to buy Turboprint he should upgrade his operating system to Amiga OS version 3.9 to get the best out of his system. See: www.gregdonner.org/os39review/os39review.html. Also, more general help can be found at the following links: www.amigaworld.net, www.amiga.org/modules/newbb/, and www.amigau.com/

Michael Domoney, via email

It is still possible to buy Centronics IEEE1284 interface printers. A quick look at www.epson.co.uk throws up the Epson Stylus Color 1160. I would drop them a brief email asking if any of their Centronics interface printers would be compatible with the Amiga. Your existing driver software for the 740 may be sufficient. Failing that, Amiga compatible printers come up on

ebay all the time. If your friend wouldn't mind dot matrix, these are still manufactured and Citizen produces a range that would likely be compatible.

Andrew Walker, via email

I have an Epson Stylus Color II Ink Jet Printer that is redundant but still working well in black print but the colour is not - and never has been too hot!  It is about nine or ten years old and has the old type connection to the PC (not USB).  It is complete with printer driver and instruction manuals. If it can be of any use to Bill Noise's friend with the Amiga 1200 and he is prepared to pay P&P please let me know.

Diana MacMaster, North Worcs,  (address forwarded to Bill Noise)

I've got an old Citizen ABC 24 pin dot matrix printer that I used to use with an Amiga 500. It's very noisy and the print quality is laughable compared to a modern printer. He can have it for nothing (with it's original box - why do we always keep them?) if he's prepared to pay the postage

Kevin Inskip, via email, (address forwarded to Bill Noise)

TALKING BLOOD SUGAR MONITOR

I have a friend who is an insulin dependant diabetic and is also blind. Until recently she had a meter for testing her blood sugar, which gave a spoken (audio) result. This meter is now broken; she has been unable to find a suitable replacement and has to rely on friends and neighbours reading her meter. I wonder if any readers have a solution?

Clive Hardy, Wimborne, Dorset

There is such a device, called the Gluki Plus Talking Blood Sugar Monitor and details can be found on the Vis-Ability web site at: www.users.waitrose.com/~visability/#Gluki

Mark Collins, via email

Roche Diagnostics, which make the Accu-Chek meters have a talking blood sugar monitor called the VoiceMate. This uses the Advantage test strips, which are available free on prescription to registered diabetics. I’m not sure who distributes this model in the UK but you should be able to find out from the Roche web site, where you will also find out more details on the Voicemate. The web address is: www.accu-chek.com/products/meters_voicemate.jsp

Joy Taylor, via email

PERFORMANCE TWEAK

It has been many years since I last ventured under the bonnet of my car and I was dismayed to find that things I used to be able to do, to maintain performance, like adjusting the contact breaker and setting the fuel mixture and so on, are now handled by a computer. I know garages have specialised equipment to connect to car computers but I was wondering if there are any ‘consumer’ programs that will work on a home PC, that will let me access and monitor my vehicle’s inner workings?

David Naughton, via email

In a previous reply to this question a correspondent said it’s best not to mess with car engine management computers! I agree that you would have to be careful and know what you are doing; however, assuming you have some knowledge there are many programs available for car diagnostics, depending on what model car you have. The cost of the interface and software can repay itself very quickly if you avoid taking your car to the dealer just to pay for them to plug in their PC for 2 minutes. I can thoroughly recommend VAG-COM from RossTech (www.ross-tech.com/) for VW and Audi group cars. The web site will give you all the info you need. The support from Ross Tech is second to none. For other makes of car do a search on OBD diagnostic software and you will find what you are after. I have only used VAG-COM myself so can't comment on other software.

R. W. via e-mail

TAX CALC ALTERNATIVES

I have just received a letter from Intuit stating that they are withdrawing Quicken and TaxCalc from the UK market and ceasing support next year. I have looked at Microsoft Money, my attempt to convert a Quicken file to Money failed (a very simple set of records of a Charity for which I am a trustee and treasurer). My own records are more complex with the usual array of PEPS, unit trusts standing orders etc.Can anyone suggest an alternative to Microsoft Money developed for the British market? An Internet interface with banks and financial institutions is now virtually essential as is a good technical help line.

Rodney Newth, (retired chartered accountant), via email

Assured Solution Providers (ASP), creators of Taxchecker, has acquired the self-assessment software brand names of TaxCalc (a former Which? product additionally developed by Intuit UK) and TaxChecker. A new product TaxCalc 2005 will be available in April 2005 and will offer users the best features of TaxCalc and TaxChecker.It will be very easy to transfer data from 2004 files into TaxCalc 2005 and will have the functionality and features familiar to existing TaxCalc users including both an "Interview" and a "Forms based" approach. More information soon at: www.taxchecker.co.uk/

Deborah Parritt, via email

CAN YOU HELP?

A crowd of 16 to 25 of us OAPs play Badminton doubles.  We like to randomise the doubles so everybody plays with and against everybody regardless of ability during our hour or more sessions.  We play men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles on up to 4 courts. We find it very difficult to keep track of who has played who or with whom and how to ensure continued mixing of teams - the boss for the day usually goes barmy... Can anyone help?

Tony Lake, via email

I recall reading somewhere that you could order spectacles over the Internet at greatly reduced prices by supplying the company with your prescription. There seems to be quite a number of organisations offering this service, has anyone used one of these services and can make a recommendation?

Eric North, via email