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george schnellman
08-23-2013, 8:42 PM
A neighbor has a hermes 1219 rotary engraver cutting board. It had a dos based design software and some kind of hybrid pc/controller. The hybrid controller died. I would like to drive the engraver with a pc somehow. Does anyone have any ideas , or can you poiunt me in a direction?

Thanks
George

Mike Null
08-24-2013, 8:31 AM
George

welcome to SMC. From my experience with New Hermes DOS based systems you'll not be able to do that. NH will probably sell you a new controller with an XP based system for more money than the original engraver cost in the first place. But don't expect much from New Hermes/Gravograph--they have worked long and hard at building their reputation as one of the least helpful suppliers in the business.

Scott Shepherd
08-24-2013, 10:55 AM
If anyone would know, it would be these people :

http://q1engravers.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=1839&sort=20a&page=1

I have linked to a parts page for that machine, but you can contact them and ask them directly about what you'd like to do.

john passek
08-25-2013, 1:42 PM
I feel your neighbors pain George , I have the exact same machine which has most of my special layouts and customer logos on it. Over the years I have been transferring them over to laser files but still have many more (sophisticated) files still to do. but it died just the other day too so now I have to painstakingly start from scratch. Good luck in you quest to breath new life into your machine.

vic casware
08-25-2013, 6:12 PM
I have a 1219 machine too with the cool retro green screen the 5 and 1/2 inch floppys and the font cartridge fonts. Ah the good old days :rolleyes: From what I have been told it is possible to retrofit with a modern controller, I will try to find the person here in NZ who has done it before and see if he will give me some info on how it's done. I would definitely keep the machine, I want to do mine up too when I get time.

john passek
08-26-2013, 2:37 AM
Vic , please keep us informed, I would love to reserect the old girl with a new OS if possible. Thanks

Uma Duffy
08-29-2013, 2:07 PM
Try this site: solustan dot com

I have 2 hybrid xenetech/dahlgren machines that ran on dos and/or win95 with apu longboards installed in the pc. Great in their day...but utterly obsolete now and it was just a matter of time before the old Win 95 machine gave up the ghost. I got new Windows7 machines and new usb controllers from Solustan and my machines are up and running and earning their keep once again. Ashmi helped me get things tweaked and calibrated and I opted for the font package that further stretched the capabilities of these 25 yr old + machines. I have no regrets on the investment. Of course I'm stuck with a lot of proprietary xenetech files...but I'm not looking back. I can do a lot more with Corel on these drag engravers. I guessing the same will be true for rotaries. Seriously- check out that site and talk to them. good luck...it can be done

Mike Null
08-30-2013, 8:07 AM
Uma

that's a great find.

I'll post the actual link. http://www.solustan.com/linkmotion_for_HPGL_engraving.php

Uma Duffy
08-30-2013, 5:38 PM
Uma

that's a great find.

I'll post the actual link. http://www.solustan.com/linkmotion_for_HPGL_engraving.php

Thanks for posting that ...I thought there was some sort of big deal about posting links. BTW, the other big advantage to this system is now our engravers only need to master one program, Corel, to run the drag engravers, lasers, dye sub printers and vinyl cutters. That alone is a big software efficiency insofar as training and sharing jobs among various pcs of equipment.
I'm a huge fan of all things that can be run open source i.e. open office, etc. When I can't go full open source for graphic arts programs at least Corel is compatible with ALL my equipment. Truth be told, I probably could go Inkscape, etc, but the industry standard does seem to be Corel. C'est la vie.