IEEE 1284
set of IEEE standards relating to parallel peripheral interfaces
IEEE 1284, also known as the Centronics port, is a standard that defines bi-directional parallel communications between computers and other devices, with a theoretical maximum throughput of 4 MB/s. It was originally developed in the 1970s by Centronics for use with dot matrix printers before being formally standardized by the IEEE in March 1994.
The standard defines five operating modes Compatibility Mode, Nibble Mode, Byte Mode, Enhanced Parallel Port (EPP), and Extended Capability Port (ECP) and three connector types. It supports a variety of peripheral devices including printers, scanners, tape drives, and hard disks. Since its release, the parallel interface has been largely displaced by local area network interfaces and USB 2.0.
History
In the 1970s, Centronics developed a parallel connector for their dot matrix printers that soon became a de facto standard.
The original port design was send-only, allowing 8 bits of data to be sent from the host computer to the printer at a time. Separate pins in the port allow status information to be sent back to the computer. This was a serious limitation as printers became "smarter" and a richer set of status codes were desired. This led to an early expansion of the system introduced by HP, the "Bitronics" implementation released in 1992.
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