AMSTRAD PCW8256 systems & sw available

[Gordon JC Pearce]

On Fri, 2007-11-30 at 16:53 -0800, Steven Martin wrote:
> My dad is 82, a retired College Professor, he owns a Amstrad PCW 8256  
> and his printer is broken. The printer head doesn't seem to go  
> anywhere so it can't print. Is there someone in the USA that you know  
> of that can help me, we are in California. If you do not know of  
> anyone in the USA is there a way you can direct me to someone I can  
> buy parts from that speaks english or at least can communicate  
> through email in english.

Considering the machines were made mostly in the UK and Germany, you
should be OK on that score.

Is the head itself free to move? I seem to recall something about buffer
chips failing in the printers that caused various odd problems -
erroneous "Bail Bar Back" messages and stuff.

Maybe you should check on eBay and see if you can pick up the
serial/parallel adaptor for it, and hang a "normal" printer off it.  You
could also squirt the documents across the serial port to a newer
computer.  If you do this, make sure you get one with the right
connector - German PCWs had a different plug to GB ones iirc.

Gordon