problems priting pdfs on HP 5si

[HokeySon]

Just like the title says -- I am having problems.

I have Adobe acrobat 9 Pro as well as acrobat reader, foxit, paperport, and a couple of other programs that can read pdfs. However, the adobe products will not print pdfs on my HP 5si printer (it will print on my other printers). the other programs will print pdfs but very, very slowly (foxit takes about 60 secs per page, Paperport will print several pages very quickly, but then slows way down as it is spooling).

My 5si is hooked up to the parallel lpt1 port. I have updated the driver just to make sure that was not it. Any got any suggestions (besides buying a newer printer -- my 5si is a tank and has lots of options).

[stilly]

Drivers.

I am wondering if there are different drivers and there USUALLY are for laserjets and fast printers, but sometimes, just choosing a different POST SCRIPT driver vs a PCL driver can make a difference, and I am NOT talking about newest/latest drivers, but maybe a driver that allows your computer to talk to the printer faster and easier. Sometimes newest aint always the best.

I only say this because of my experience in installing about 7 printers on a LAN at a print shop last year. I saw a BIG difference on a couple of those printers when I used a post script driver vs pcl driver... HP is known to have these. Let me lookie: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...5&swEnvOID=228


Yeah, it looks like you can go pcl or post script. Try the other driver. If that does not work then I would suggest that you also check the following:

Printer resolution?? Are you printing at 300x300 dpi or bigger? If you are printing bigger then that is prolly your problem.

Try this, open up printers, right click the one you use, the 5si and goto properties. Look for the button or tab that says PRINTING PREFERENCES and click it, look for your PRINT QUALITY DPI somewhere in there and see what you can set it to, if you are over 300 dpi you should drop the res down.

Hope that helps.

[the86d]

Does it have the postscript module installed? (If using postscript...)

How much RAM does the printer have installed?

How much RAM do you have it set to in the printer properties of the driver?


The pcl driver is usually much quicker to print.

[HokeySon]

Drivers.

I am wondering if there are different drivers and there USUALLY are for laserjets and fast printers, but sometimes, just choosing a different POST SCRIPT driver vs a PCL driver can make a difference, and I am NOT talking about newest/latest drivers, but maybe a driver that allows your computer to talk to the printer faster and easier. Sometimes newest aint always the best.

I only say this because of my experience in installing about 7 printers on a LAN at a print shop last year. I saw a BIG difference on a couple of those printers when I used a post script driver vs pcl driver... HP is known to have these. Let me lookie: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport...5&swEnvOID=228


Yeah, it looks like you can go pcl or post script. Try the other driver. If that does not work then I would suggest that you also check the following:

Printer resolution?? Are you printing at 300x300 dpi or bigger? If you are printing bigger then that is prolly your problem.

Try this, open up printers, right click the one you use, the 5si and goto properties. Look for the button or tab that says PRINTING PREFERENCES and click it, look for your PRINT QUALITY DPI somewhere in there and see what you can set it to, if you are over 300 dpi you should drop the res down.

Hope that helps.

I have tried a few drivers -- including the one linked to above.

I was trying to print at 600 x600. I backed that down to 300x300 and had a conflict with the HPGL2 graphics mode. So I switched to "raster" graphics mode (don't know what that is honestly).

Tried to print from acrobat pro and got the same result == program hangs. BUT, printed from Foxit much, much faster. This is not the first problem that I have had with acrobat pro -- I have had other conflicts -- you would think the leading brand would deal with conflicts better. Anyway, I know have a work around at least.

Does it have the postscript module installed? (If using postscript...)

How much RAM does the printer have installed?

How much RAM do you have it set to in the printer properties of the driver?


The pcl driver is usually much quicker to print.

No PS module installed.

printer has 8gb ram

I do not know the answer to your other question -- how do I check it and what would be optimum?

thanks guys.

[orchard]

Speed is also dependent on the content of the PDF. When you have the PDF open, you can click on properties. If there are fonts not supported by your printer, the job has to download the fonts and then use them.
If their are drawings or images in the PDF, the writer tries to minimize the printer task by either sending the whole page as an image, or replacing GL/2 commands with a raster format (raster is like writing to a screen - one row of pixels, then next row, etc.)
Look under advanced settings for the driver - make sure substitute device fonts is selected.

[HokeySon]

Speed is also dependent on the content of the PDF. When you have the PDF open, you can click on properties. If there are fonts not supported by your printer, the job has to download the fonts and then use them.
If their are drawings or images in the PDF, the writer tries to minimize the printer task by either sending the whole page as an image, or replacing GL/2 commands with a raster format (raster is like writing to a screen - one row of pixels, then next row, etc.)
Look under advanced settings for the driver - make sure substitute device fonts is selected.

thanks. I will do that too.

[the86d]

No PS module installed.

printer has 8gb ram

I do not know the answer to your other question -- how do I check it and what would be optimum?

thanks guys.

8MB I assume, as I don't think that they can address 8GB.

Depending on the OS you would right click the printer (one of the 3 ways to get there...) and in XP click on properties, on 7 "Printer properties" => "Device Settings", and under "Installable options" check "Printer Memory" but I don't know if that would help much with the slow throughput of the LPT port combined with only 8MB of RAM, as I have a 100Mbps NIC in mine and have not plugged in a parallel printer in years. I think unless ECP is supported on both devices you only get
8x serial, which would only be like 921,600 bits/second vs. (if it is USB 1.0) like 1.5Mbps to 12Mbps on USB 1.0.

If I recall correctly they have a USB port on the back (mine is at home), and that might be faster...

Have you tried to save a PDF, and print it after opening from Adobe Reader just as a test? I don't know much about PS, Foxit, and Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro print speeds, but I would try printing from "Reader" with the PCL drivers (Not the PostScript Driver, as you don't have the PS module installed) installed and set to the correct amount of RAM in the printer via the driver as I stated above 1st to see if it speeds up...

[stilly]

raster is faster but vector is correcter...

What it means is that it treats print jobs as images/photos. Photos and drawings are RASTERS, as in RASTER image, they are based on lines of code per pixel. If you take a scanned 35mm negative and blow it up with a computer to be full screen, there is a VERY good chance that you will blur it out really fast. IF you take a VECTOR and blow it up full screen, since they are based on math and calculations, it will still look good.

Raster images are basically photos and things with pixels, so you turned your documents into images before you print them. Does it make a difference? It MIGHT somewhere down the road on another project, but for now it seems to help. You might even be able to go less than 300x300 but I would stick with 300dpi. Glad there is a work around but it would bug me and I would still keep looking for a solution. Perhaps it really is just time to kick this old printer to the curb and get another one? I have 4 laserjet printers but I am looking to get rid of three of them. Oh they are VERY nice because they are LASERJET but damn they are very big too. With prices dropping as low as they are, you could get a pretty good deal on ebay for a laserjet for under $250 delivered. ANd that is a BIG networked laserjet. (is there really any other kind to own?)

To be honest I really like forced upgrades and if I had a printer that was hella old then I would look around and get a nice used laserjet to replace it and THEN see if I have the same problems. If I did then I would start looking at finding solutions because it could very well be possible that people might have the same problem as you but with newer printers and there IS a fix for newer ones but you can not find the fix for older ones due to the internet not being invented when they were around... :\

[HokeySon]

8MB I assume, as I don't think that they can address 8GB.

Depending on the OS you would right click the printer (one of the 3 ways to get there...) and in XP click on properties, on 7 "Printer properties" => "Device Settings", and under "Installable options" check "Printer Memory" but I don't know if that would help much with the slow throughput of the LPT port combined with only 8MB of RAM, as I have a 100Mbps NIC in mine and have not plugged in a parallel printer in years. I think unless ECP is supported on both devices you only get
8x serial, which would only be like 921,600 bits/second vs. (if it is USB 1.0) like 1.5Mbps to 12Mbps on USB 1.0.

If I recall correctly they have a USB port on the back (mine is at home), and that might be faster...

Have you tried to save a PDF, and print it after opening from Adobe Reader just as a test? I don't know much about PS, Foxit, and Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro print speeds, but I would try printing from "Reader" with the PCL drivers (Not the PostScript Driver, as you don't have the PS module installed) installed and set to the correct amount of RAM in the printer via the driver as I stated above 1st to see if it speeds up...

yes 8mb, mistyped.

I have a nic on mine too, but it is bad, that is why I have to use parallel (no USB)

I will try what you suggest as this is still bugging me

raster is faster but vector is correcter...

What it means is that it treats print jobs as images/photos. Photos and drawings are RASTERS, as in RASTER image, they are based on lines of code per pixel. If you take a scanned 35mm negative and blow it up with a computer to be full screen, there is a VERY good chance that you will blur it out really fast. IF you take a VECTOR and blow it up full screen, since they are based on math and calculations, it will still look good.

Raster images are basically photos and things with pixels, so you turned your documents into images before you print them. Does it make a difference? It MIGHT somewhere down the road on another project, but for now it seems to help. You might even be able to go less than 300x300 but I would stick with 300dpi. Glad there is a work around but it would bug me and I would still keep looking for a solution. Perhaps it really is just time to kick this old printer to the curb and get another one? I have 4 laserjet printers but I am looking to get rid of three of them. Oh they are VERY nice because they are LASERJET but damn they are very big too. With prices dropping as low as they are, you could get a pretty good deal on ebay for a laserjet for under $250 delivered. ANd that is a BIG networked laserjet. (is there really any other kind to own?)

To be honest I really like forced upgrades and if I had a printer that was hella old then I would look around and get a nice used laserjet to replace it and THEN see if I have the same problems. If I did then I would start looking at finding solutions because it could very well be possible that people might have the same problem as you but with newer printers and there IS a fix for newer ones but you can not find the fix for older ones due to the internet not being invented when they were around... :\

I understand. But, i need to stick with this thing even if I have to use a work around -- it has all the accessories, like a sorter, envelope tray, 3,000 page tray, and some other stuff, it is perfect for what I use it for which is big volumes of black and white text pages-- at least before this problem.

Anyway. thanks again.

[meaty-btz]

If you look at the printer queue while sending in vector mode, does your print job have Zero Bytes?

Common with PDFs and Cannons (not HPs usually) is the Zero Byte PDF glitch, common on all large corporate Cannon Copiers which requires that you software rasterize the PDF before printing. Yes it is a driver error, no there usually is no solution except software rasterized printing (hint, all PDFs are raster prints, the question being who rasterizes, the printer or the software on the PC, lasers often have native fonts which give an assured output in said fonts no matter what is printing).

The work around to the zero byte print job bug is to go into the Advanced tab on printing in adobe acrobat and choose: Print as Image (software raster).

[DiscoBayJoe]

you tried the HP universal Print Driver?

[stilly]

If you look at the printer queue while sending in vector mode, does your print job have Zero Bytes?

Common with PDFs and Cannons (not HPs usually) is the Zero Byte PDF glitch, common on all large corporate Cannon Copiers which requires that you software rasterize the PDF before printing. Yes it is a driver error, no there usually is no solution except software rasterized printing (hint, all PDFs are raster prints, the question being who rasterizes, the printer or the software on the PC, lasers often have native fonts which give an assured output in said fonts no matter what is printing).

The work around to the zero byte print job bug is to go into the Advanced tab on printing in adobe acrobat and choose: Print as Image (software raster).

This seems like a very logical step as my experience is lacking with pdfs. Personally though, I would even go ONE step further, MAybe EXPORT all pages as images and then just send them all to the printer with an image program like Faststone or something (it is free).

I know what it is like having bad hardware or trying to find a workaround for it, I have an HP laserjet P3005N that I use and when that formatter board went I about yanked out all of my hair at the cost of replacing it. Thankfully there was this cool guy in Israel...

[wilit]

Weird. I have a 5si/mx at work and I print PDF's to it every day. I don't have to convert or change anything with the PDF.

[HokeySon]

If you look at the printer queue while sending in vector mode, does your print job have Zero Bytes?

Common with PDFs and Cannons (not HPs usually) is the Zero Byte PDF glitch, common on all large corporate Cannon Copiers which requires that you software rasterize the PDF before printing. Yes it is a driver error, no there usually is no solution except software rasterized printing (hint, all PDFs are raster prints, the question being who rasterizes, the printer or the software on the PC, lasers often have native fonts which give an assured output in said fonts no matter what is printing).

The work around to the zero byte print job bug is to go into the Advanced tab on printing in adobe acrobat and choose: Print as Image (software raster).

No. It spools and that shows in the printer status.

[HokeySon]

Thanks everyone for your help. I am done trying to figure this out. Seems to be a problem with PDF professional communicating with the printer. This is not my primary printer. As I mentioned I use it to print big text documents. So, I am comfortable with a work around where I just close the PDF professional program and open another viewer to print from there. But you all helped me figure out the work around so I am ver appreciative. Thanks to everyone.