If you get the message CANNOT ACCESS SOFTWARE PROTECTION DEVICE!
when you try to start up EMME/2, this indicates that EMME/2 cannot
access your INROkey. In this case, make sure that your INROkey is
indeed attached to a parallel port of your PC. If a printer is attached to
it, remove it for the moment to exclude any printer related problems
(if this solves the problem, see the printer related questions below).
If you have more than
one parallel port and if the INROkey is not attached to LPT1, you have to
put the line SET E2KEY=LPTx into your AUTOEXEC.BAT
file.
Try first if you get EMME/2 running without a printer connected. If this does not work either, then the problem is not related to the printer, so the following does not apply.
Then note that, if a printer is connected to the INROkey, it has to be switched on, otherwise the INROkey will most likely not work. This is due to the low input impedance of most printers when they are turned off.
If the printer is switched on and EMME/2 still cannot access the INROkey
(which does happen on rare occasions),
this might be due to either the printer drawing too much current from
the parallel port (input impedance too low) or the parallel port in the PC
not delivering enough current (output impedance too high). In both cases
the best, safest and cheapest solution is to install a second parallel port on the PC,
configure it as LPT2, connect the INROkey to it and add the
line "SET E2KEY=LPT2" to your AUTOEXEC.BAT. An ISA card
with an additional parallel port cost about CHF 20 (or about $15 in
the US), so this is by far cheaper than any other solution (including
changing your PC or printer...).
There is also a chance that the problem may be solved by modifying the printer cable in the following way: Open the DB-25M connector (PC-side of the printer cable) and cut the wires that lead to pin 14 and/or pin 17. But given that a) this operation is a little tricky unless you have already experience with this kind of tinkering, and b) it is not guaranteed to always work, I consider adding a second parallel port by far the safer and easier alternative.
As in the above question, the problem is most likely due to a mismatch in the output impedance of the parallel port and the combined input impedance of the INROkey and the printer. As mentioned above, the best solution is adding a second parallel port to your PC.
However, if the printer does work when connected through the INROkey, but generates garbage characters, this may be a sign of a hardware problem within the INROkey. Contact INRO or the EMME/2 Support Center in this case.
If you get an error message of the type
``MODULE exxx DOES NOT EXIST!'' this indicates
that EMME/2 cannot find the corresponding binary file in the
emme2\bin directory. Check for the file exxx.exe
in the directory \emme2\bin of the current drive (if the variable
EMME2 is not set), or in the directory %EMME2%\bin otherwise.
You can also create a file named debug in the directory from which
you start EMME/2. This will generate echoes of all DOS commands as they
are executed, allowing you to trace what is happening exactly. (Don't forget
to remove the file debug after the problem has been solved.)
This is probably because you have not defined the variable EMME2
to contain the full drive:path specification of your EMME/2
directory. In this case EMME/2 always looks in the \emme2
directory of the current drive. Assuming that you have installed
EMME/2 on the C: drive, trying to run EMME/2 from any other drive
will fail, since the directory \emme2 can't be found on that
other drive. To solve the problem, simply add the line
SET EMME2=C:\EMME2 to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.