ISA to PCI/PCIe Plug for a Mother Board

PCIe doesn't sound likely, although I do notice there are some ISA to PCI setups out there, just search http://search.globalspec.com/Search?query=ISA%20to%20PCI&show=total and I found a few.

Even easier though, is USB an option for you? This product appears to do this: http://www.arstech.com/item-USB-2-0-to-ISA-right-angle-card-usb2isara.html

Thank you for this information, It looks like one or the other might be a viable answer to my problem. Thank you again.

I doubt you can make an ISA to PCI conversion. All signals differ greatly.

You may be better off finding an OLder ISA computer to run it and then transferring the finshed drawing from a modern computer with CAD program to the older machine to run it.

The CNC guys run this as a racket to force you to buy new stuff.

The easiest thing by far is the most obvious one: Use an old computer, with an old operating system and old CNC software to operate the machine. If you have new software that requires a newer machine, you can use it "offline" from the machine and transfer the finished program to the old computer hooked to the machine.

These things are done all the time, and no reason it shouldn't work in your case. The earlier pentium machines typically had both ISA and PCI slots, and if you ask around, you can probably get one for nothing.

The two-machine scenario is cheap, simple and very workable. You might also look into what is sent to the cnc machine itself - lots of times these are run by standard serial or parallel interfaces with funny pin-outs and 'special' cards. You may need a driver writing guy, but likely not even that.

Why not bite the bullet and go for a complete new modern computer system from another company? I am sure that $5000 will probably cover most of it, that way you can show the middle finger to this other company.....and be modern again. Especially if the CNC machine can be driven from almost any computer

Of course, if the CNC machine is huge, that might not be a good answer, but here in europe, small CNC machines go from about $2000 upwards I believe!

Let me know if I should do some proper research for you in this area.

Beware of what I call "One-way-Cul-de-Sacs" in the future. You might call it a "one way street into a dead end" in the USA!!!

A friend of mine spent a lot on a German CNC autopuncher and every bloody part was coded and unique, even 1/4 resistors had been painted, and every time this thing failed they flew a guy in from Germany $$$$.

Of course it worked most of the time and he made millions off it, but when it was broken, so was his business.

There is no such device. I've run into the same problem and am still surprised some small company hasn't come up with a converter.

My situation is one of a legacy PLC system that will be replaced within a few years and I only need the device once every few years. I still have to dig out and dust off the 386sx with Windows 3.1 to do the work. Worse yet, there is a serial adapter that will work but the software will not run on anything faster than a 486. Something to do with interrupt speed or the like.

It must not be much of a market, unless you are in need, in which case it seems like it would be a great market. It isn't worth spending $2000 or more and in your case much more for an interim period.

It comes down to two choices:

Buy the upgrade or keep using a machine with an ISA slot until you can justify the upgrade.

My previous post is obviously wrong since I have now found this.

http://www.cyberresearch.com/store/computer-accessories-pc-peripherals/bus-adapters-expansion-chassis/

Looks like for $150 for an enclosed expansion chassis and either $500 or $600 you can extend the life of your current system.

If you go this route let us know how it works.

That might be a viable solution. Worth checking out

Reading over the fine print, here are some restrictions, mainly DMA access that the ISA card you mount in the remote chassis can not do and a few other restrictions

www.linuxcnc.org (aka EMC2)

9 axis synchronized motion

stepper motors or servos, feedback from encoder/resolver/scales

very flexible

kinematics for non-standard machines

search youtube for emc2 to see it in action

price $0.00 - free software!