Windows direct cable connection speed

I've been using this for quite a while, and thought I was getting all the speed it's supposed to do. Today I just noticed that when it connects up, it says "4.0 megabits". All this time, I've been transferring files between my two machines at about 40kbytes/second, which is obviously way less than what windows is reporting the connection at. Curious, I opened up "Upgrading and Repairing PC's" to the bit about parallel ports, and it says that EPP/ECP ports are capable of up to 2 megabytes per second! Much higher than what I'm transferring at, or what windows is reporting.

So I went and checked the BIOS on both machines. The laptop was set correctly, but the desktop's port was set to SPP. Aha, I say, that's the problem. I set it to EPP/ECP and rebooted windows, thinking I was in for a major speed boost. No such luck! Same thing, reports 4 megabits, transfers at ~40kbytes per second.

So my question is, does anybody know why? What am I doing wrong here. If the ports can go at 2 megabytes per second, I obviously want them to do it!

Are you useing a high speed parallel cable "Lap Link" or a standerd cable?

The cable's package said it was a "Direct Cable Connection" cable. Why, do you have to use something better to get the higher speeds?