A benefit of the Ethernet version is you can control your CNC from pretty much any computer on your network. If for some reason you blow up your board, you won't fry your computer / network (and trust me, that HAS happened with the USB version due to user error). As an additional bonus over the USB SmoothStepper, the Ethernet version is by design 100% isolated from your computer and network. It has three on board parallel port equivalents (compared to 2 on the USB version, and 1 on the UC-100), and again those are bidirectional. It pulses at 4 megahertz, which basically means it can handle anything you can throw at it. The Ethernet version of the SmoothStepper is all around the best motion controller currently available that I am aware of. The USB SmoothStepper is compatible with Mach3 only. In order to connect either of the SmoothSteppers to your already parallel machine, you'll need an IDC26 to DB25 adapter found here. As a negative the USB SmoothStepper can have a little bit of noise if not properly grounded. That basically means you can use any pin for whatever you want (an input or an output). Each of the ports have the same 17 pins in the IDC26 connection, but they capable of full bidirectional communication. Both the USB and Ethernet version have more than 1 parallel port equivalent on board, the USB version has 2, and the Ethernet version has 3. This provides for a very 'Smooth' operation that is basically unparalleled by anything on the market. They have a high powered processor on board that processes into the 1-4 Megahertz range. If you're on a budget, the UC100 is probably more than enough as long as you don't have an overly complicated system.īoth the USB and Ethernet versions of the SmoothStepper operate in approximately the same way. In almost all cases 100kHz is more than adequate though. It is also (much) slower than the SmoothSteppers only pulsing at around 100kHz.
There are two drawbacks over the SmoothSteppers and that is you are limited to the standard DB25 (parallel connector) which only has the standard number of pins (17) which can limit your control.
It is compatible with Mach3 (not Mach4 yet) or it can be controlled with UCCNC software, which is very inexpensive compared to Mach3.
If you already have your setup running on a parallel port, the UC100 will plug in directly into your parallel connection and pretty effortlessly transition your connection from parallel to USB. Definitely something good to have if your parallel port can't pass the muster of Mach3's "Driver Test" program. I have experience with all three devices, and all three are great! They all function in approximately the same capacity as external motion controllers that take the burden off of your computer's processor.
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