Centronics

A standard computer interface for connecting printers, CD-ROM drives and other devices. Although Centronics Corporation designed the original standard, the Centronics interface used by modern computers was designed by Epson Corporation. For PCs, almost all parallel ports conform to the Centronics standard. Two new parallel port standards that are backward compatible with Centronics, but offer faster transmission rates, are ECP (Extend Capabilities Port) and EPP (Enhanced Parallel Port). On the Macintosh side of the fence, Centronic connections are of the SCSI flavor only (See WFTD: Centronics 50).