[wtopace]

Thanks WTO.

I am now having issue with estop. When I first loaded up the OS, I had the X at the limit switch. The lhs of the screen (alert area?) kept stating X at limit switch and would not respond to the "reset". Rebooted - no luck. To be honest I am not sure WHAT I did to finally get some response. I THINK I held the pendant hard to the left with X selected and continuously hit "reset". After reffing the axes, I have had Z go off to the limit switch once too and hang.

I don't know what the heck I'm doing of course., but Mach was always responsive to a reset once a limit switch was tripped.

The other strange thing, I used the conversational programming to do a facing operation in midair, and everything went as expected except that the spindle never ran despite having s 500 in the G code.

Wish I knew what the heck I was doing.... LOL

I wish I could help you more, but my PathPilot shipment hasn't arrived yet. Hopefully someone else here will chime in and help you.

You can double check the parallel cable to make sure its seated properly at both ends, I would make sure to unplug it and plug it back in. Also, make sure to screw in both screws to keep it seated while the machine is moving.
If that doesn't fix it, check to see if you have a ferrite on the cable and make sure it is at the PC end of the cable (this helps with signal interference).
If you still have problems, you might want to power off and reseat your PCI-e card (remove it, make sure contacts are clean and plug it back in).

Most of your problems sound software-related though, so these suggestions may not fix anything, but they definitely shouldn't hurt anything either.

If you still have problems... you might want to call Tormach =) Keep us posted!