Hello!

Great forum! I'm looking for some help adding a Metrologic Orbit MS7120 scanner to my father-in-law's Samsung SER-6540 cash register. He'd been having problems with an older Metrologic single line scanner which was working intermittently (probably too old), so I bought him an upgrade. However I'm having a few problems getting the Orbit to communicate with the SER-6540. Using Samtools, I've retrieved what I think are the communications options set to the SER-6540 port number 1 (port 1 is the scanner, port 2 is PC polling), please see attached screenshot.

Obviously I'm going wrong somewhere, but based on the details from this image, I used the MetroSet manual to program the Orbit scanner with the following barcodes, scanning each barcode into the Orbit in this order.

1. 3999998 Recall defaults.
2. 3415554 Enable RS-232 mode
3. 3316045 No Parity (default is Space Parity)
4. 3415830 2400 BAUD rate (default is 9600)
5. 3116013 8 Data Bits (default is 7)
6. 3116014 1 Stop Bit (default is 2)

I figured that this was the right sequence of barcodes to scan into the Orbit to get it communicating with the SER-6540. However because it's not working, I think I may be misinterpreting the information from SamTools. For example Baud Rate "00" might not mean 2400 in Samtools.

He has got a manual for the SER-6540 but I'm not really sure how I can get the SER-6540 to print out it's communications settings. Also I've thought about changing the SER-6540's port 1 settings to match the Orbit's default settings, but again, I don't know how to do this on the SER-6540, and if I get it wrong, the current single line scanner will stop working too!

So where am I going wrong? Please! Someone help!

Thanks a million! Kev.

Also, I forgot to mention that I had to use a gender changer to plug the Orbit into the SER-6540 since both plug and socket were female (although stangely the old scanner's plug is male RS232). However I don't think that this will make any difference, the PC connected to port 2 is also connected with a gender changer in between the SER-6540 and the serial cable leading to the PC.

Cheers!

hi
6500's..........
that takes me back!
the settings you posted are no where near what i would use as a guess!
i would be tempted at 9600 odd 8 1
but its dependant on the cash register.
turn the key to p
enter 15 into sub total then 3 into x times
[press cash to finish before turning the key back to Reg]
post here
comms options 50 through to 70
then we can see what the till is expecting - never used that programming utility either, metrologic [ now honeywell] usually ship a book of programming codes with each scanner.
once we get the correct comms codes, we can advise on programming
cheers
Andy

Hi Andy!

Thanks for the reply, really appreciate it. Yes the SER-6540 looks to be a really old model, but he's very happy with it, and now he's coming up to retirement, I dare not ask him to replace it!

OK, I did what you asked about printing off the communication options, and here they are:

COMM. OPN 50 0
COMM. OPN 51 0
COMM. OPN 52 1
COMM. OPN 53 5
COMM. OPN 54 3000
COMM. OPN 55 0
COMM. OPN 56 0
COMM. OPN 57 0
COMM. OPN 58 0
COMM. OPN 59 0
COMM. OPN 60 2
COMM. OPN 61 0
COMM. OPN 62 0
COMM. OPN 63 1
COMM. OPN 64 3000
COMM. OPN 65 0
COMM. OPN 66 0
COMM. OPN 67 0
COMM. OPN 68 0
COMM. OPN 69 0
COMM. OPN 70 0

Reading the SER-6540 manual (I found one online too if you need to check it Andy, and I've attached a screenshot of the relevant page), I think SamTools was wrong about the Parity, it is indeed Odd, not None. I think the Baud rate is still 2400 however.

With this, I scanned in new barcodes into the Orbit, changing the Parity barcode to the Odd one. However this made no difference. Items are scanning, the Orbit beeps, but nothing appears on the till. So I changed the Baud rate of the till to 9600, and then programmed the Orbit accordingly. Again, nothing. So I've now put the Baud rate back to 2400 so he can use the old scanner again. I also tried changing option 54 (number of retries for port 1) to the default 30 as per the manual (not sure why it was set on 3000 if it has to be between 1 and 999), but to no avail.

Baffled! I can't think what else could be wrong. I don't think the till is at fault. Perhaps the Orbit scanner is faulty? I have an old laptop with a serial port I could plug it into to check, but not sure how I would check, can I get the Orbit to input barcode numbers into Notepad or something?

Please help! Cheers, Kev.

P.S. Yes I've got the Metrologic Orbit manual from their website, it's what I'm using to scan the barcodes into the Orbit, not MetroSet, which is their PC utility to set up the Orbit via a PC, which I haven't used though. Another thought - could the barcodes I'm using be wrong for this particular Orbit? It seems to take them though, with a beep and then a further double beep (presumably to say yes I've updated this setting).

50=0
51=0
52=1..............there's your mistake - parity for scanner should be odd you scanned space?
53=5
54=3000 maximum is 999 - set it to 30

i have no idea how to attach files on here,if you cant find the relevant barcode for parity, pm me your email addy and i will send you the correct setup scan sheet for the 6500 series
cheers
Andy

Andy, thanks again for the reply. No, I did scan 'Odd' into the scanner, 'Space' is the scanner's default. So I'm still missing something. There are hundreds of other configurations looking through the MetroSelect Configuration Guide, so could it be something else?

I don't know if this is important, but I read somewhere that scanning the 'Default' barcode into the scanner obviously sets it back to factory settings, but disables something called "laser emulation". The advice was to re-enable laser emulation if required. What is this? Could it be the problem?

Also I've managed to establish that the scanner works OK. I plugged it into my old laptop into the serial port and it did communicate with the Metrologic configuration software (which I downloaded from Honeywell's website). The software was able to download and upload data to and from the scanner. Also, I tested a few barcodes in the terminal window of the software, and they appeared as printed on the products themselves. So I think we can safely say that the scanner is working.

Have you ever heard of anyone connecting an Orbit to an SER-6540? This might sound stupid, but maybe they're just not compatible?

I'll PM you my email address for the barcode sheet please.

Thanks! Kev.

Hi,
Have used the 7120 on the Sam4 ER390 and upwards for our customers with no issues at all.
Usual setting that we use are 9600, 8, none, 1, and leave rest alone.
A gender changer is used on whichever port is used, to enable client to use scanner on PC if they want.

For customers who don't want the orbit 7120, we use the Metro/Honeywell 9590 with stand, same settings as above, same results.

Kind Regards
Paul

Thanks for the reply Paul. I just gave 'Space' Parity a try, and it didn't work either! Not sure what's wrong with this damn thing! In desperation, I plugged the Orbit into Port 2 and configured Port 2 on the SER-6540 for a scanner (obviously reconfiguring the Orbit to match). That didn't work either! And then the old scanner on Port 1 stopped working too! I thought maybe the SER-6540 was incapable of handling two scanners at once, so reverted Port 2 back to PC polling. Still no joy with the old scanner on Port 1. So I reconfigured Port 1 as 2400, odd, 8, 1, as were the original settings. That did the trick, made the old scanner work with Port 1 again. But I configured Port 2, not Port 1, so why did the old scanner stop working with Port 1? Is this normal - for the till to forget the settings for Port 1 when Port 2 is configured for a scanner also!

Truely bizarre! I thought this whole process would be a lot easier! I might have to give up and get a professional in. Do know how much one would charge for configuring a scanner to a till?

If it's any help, the old scanner is a Metrologic MS951. Just in case someone knows a special setting of the MS951 that I need to replicate on the Orbit!

Thanks! Please help!

Kev.

you cannot set both ports the same!
enter 0 into all port settings - from 50 to 65
then power off/on
then reprogram 2400 odd 8 1 [0,0,1,5,30] into the first port, scan the sheet i sent you - job done!
is it a mk1 or mk2 6540?
the orbit definitely works with that model-
honest

Finally got the Orbit to work! YES!

And it was all thanks to Andy's configuration sheets which he sent by email, so a million thanks Andy! The sheet that worked was the 'METROLOGIC MS9520/40 (NEW VOYAGER) CONFIGURATION TO 6500 MK1' sheet. I tried the other sheet first (for all Samsungs), but that didn't work, and so tried the second sheet which did work. Looking at the two now, I think I know why - the barcode for UPC/EAN PREFIX ON is different on the two sheets.

The bigger question is why it took me so long to configure it! Does anyone know why UPC/EAN PREFIX is disabled by default? Perhaps it's a setting that newer cash registers don't need.

Anyway, thanks to all for their help, especially Andy!

Cheers! Kev.

P.S. I think it's a MKI model because there's no mention of II anywhere on it or on the manual!