Digital BW, The Print

Sorry folks, but I cannot solve my printing problems.

I am running XP and a new Epson 4000.

About 50% of the time when I am printing, the printer stalls partway 
through a print with the message 'printing' still on the LCD display.

The status monitor comes up with an 'error during printing' and I 
lose my print.
The printer is then offline in the control panel!

I have a USB2 interface and I have switched between various ports on 
the motherboard and PCI card - no difference.

I have updated the printer driver from the website - no help.

I have spoke to Epson - their answer, reinstall windows, re-install 
the driver.  After 2 hours tonight I have done this - first print 
out, same problem!

I have tried numerous spool settings in the properties and now I am 
stuck.

Do you have any ideas what I could try, has anyone seen this 
problem.  It's getting expensive, plus I am not particularly 
impressed that I cannot use my nice new machine!

Crying out for help!  
Steve

Hi Stephen;

I've had an occassional instance of this problem with a string of 
1280s and once or twice with my 7500. I wish I could tell you how to 
solve it or what causes it. When I get it, I cancel the printing 
job, turn of the printer, wait about a minute, the turn it on and 
send the print to the printer again. It almost never repeats the 
problem any time soon, I've never heard of anyone not being able to 
get even one print done, though. 

I think the problem is in the Windows spooling system; it seems to 
me the spooler is simply dumping half the job, or never spooled it 
in the first place. Have you done all the Windows SP1 updates? 
Surprisingly enough not all of them are security-hole related.

The other item that might help is RAM. 512 MB is minimal for WinXP 
and PS together. If you don't have at least that much, think about 
getting more. 

See if you can get a finished print by going to the printer 
properties box and checking (under the 'advanced' tab) 'print 
directly to the printer'. This bypasses the spooling system, but has 
the major disadvantage of tying up the computer completely. But at 
least it might verify that it's Win related, not printer.

Best luck,

Steve

http://www.stevekphoto.com


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "scrber" 
<stephen.bate@m...> wrote:
> Sorry folks, but I cannot solve my printing problems.
> 
> I am running XP and a new Epson 4000.
> 
> About 50% of the time when I am printing, the printer stalls 
partway 
> through a print with the message 'printing' still on the LCD 
display.
> 
> The status monitor comes up with an 'error during printing' and I 
> lose my print.
> The printer is then offline in the control panel!
> 
> I have a USB2 interface and I have switched between various ports 
on 
> the motherboard and PCI card - no difference.
> 
> I have updated the printer driver from the website - no help.
> 
> I have spoke to Epson - their answer, reinstall windows, re-
install 
> the driver.  After 2 hours tonight I have done this - first print 
> out, same problem!
> 
> I have tried numerous spool settings in the properties and now I 
am 

> stuck.
> 
> Do you have any ideas what I could try, has anyone seen this 
> problem.  It's getting expensive, plus I am not particularly 
> impressed that I cannot use my nice new machine!
> 
> Crying out for help!  
> Steve

Steve-

I've never had this problem but you should first be sure it is a 
windows issue.

Have you tried printing with any application other than PS?

When you installed the 4000 drivers, did you follow all the 
instructions on the order of connecting the printer, etc? 

Very importantly...did you disable your firewall and virus scan 
programs while you installed it?

Do you have another printer working on the same machine without 
problem? (if you do, it is almost certainly a problem with the 4000 
driver or driver installation).

I don't know where you bought your printer, but 
DigitalArtSupplies.com has given me great tech support for the 2 
small problems I did have with it using the Epson driver (I'm now 
mostly using Image Print).

Post again if these ideas don't work...there will surely be someone 
here with the right answer.

good luck,

Tom O'Connell

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Tom OConnell" 
<tomoc@y...> wrote:
> Steve-
> 
> I've never had this problem but you should first be sure it is a 
> windows issue.
> 
> Have you tried printing with any application other than PS?
> 
> When you installed the 4000 drivers, did you follow all the 
> instructions on the order of connecting the printer, etc? 
> 
> Very importantly...did you disable your firewall and virus scan 
> programs while you installed it?
> 
> Do you have another printer working on the same machine without 
> problem? (if you do, it is almost certainly a problem with the 4000 
> driver or driver installation).
> 
> I don't know where you bought your printer, but 
> DigitalArtSupplies.com has given me great tech support for the 2 
> small problems I did have with it using the Epson driver (I'm now 
> mostly using Image Print).
> 
> Post again if these ideas don't work...there will surely be someone 
> here with the right answer.
> 
> good luck,
> 
> Tom O'Connell

I do have other printers working fine - but they are all on USB1.1

Spoke to Epson again, much more helpful guy this time.  Was not too 
pleased that his colleague told me to re-install windows - dumb idea, 
another PS activation bites the dust....

Anyway, their knowledge base is pointing to a problem with 
hyperthreaded P4 processors, USB2 and the 4000 - which does not 
currently seem to be addressed with the downloads.
I will re-install the drivers (after ripping them out completely this 
time) and try it from scratch with firewire.

I didn't take out all my Norton stuff the first time I installed, but 
I tried that with Epson on Sunday running with MSCONFIG open and the 
systray empty - made no difference.

Thanks

Steve