Corrupted printer output in Windows XP

Question

Having some difficulty with a Windows XP computer that only prints garbage, no matter which program is used - even the test page comes out as garbage. I've tried testing it using the XPS Document Writer, but the resulting files are also corrupted. If I print to the Microsoft Office Document Image Writer, the resulting TIFF files are fine.

I'd rather not have to completely re-image the machine, but that's the only option I've got left.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

The Lexmark E260dn supports both PCL and Postscript. If you are using a PCL driver, try switching to the PS driver - or vice versa.

Since it supports PCL5 and Postscript you can hand edit very simple PCL5 and Postscript test pages and use Windows "lpr" command to send them without passing through Window print drivers. This can help narrow down the source of the problem.

Postscript test:

%!PS
/Helvetica 24 selectfont
100 500 moveto
(Testing 1 2 3) show
showpage

PCL5 test:

^[E^[&k2G^[&l6D^[&l0OLine 1 ..1....v....2....v....3....v....4....v....5....v....6....v....7....v....8....v....9....v....0....v....1....v....2....v....3....v....4....v....5
Line 2
3
4
5
6
7
...
80

(where ^[ is the escape character (hex 1b decimal 27))

Remote diagnosis of printing problems is hard. Get a cooperative person at the site to use the printer's control panel to print a test page and to print out the settings. They can then use an old-fashioned fax machine to send them to you.

The n in E260dn implies network-connected. Can other PCs print to the printer? If you are using VNC, you will be able to telnet to the printer and get it to show configuration settings.

Answer 2

What type of printer are you using? You need to obtain the drivers (either from the installation CD or from the vendor's web site) and use them to print. The "XPS Document Writer" and "Microsoft Office Document Image Writer" are not the correct drivers to use for actual printers as they are software print drivers (possibly in an attempt to compete with products like PDF Creator which generate a PDF file in place of actual hardware that generates a hardcopy form of whatever you're printing).

  PDF Creator
  http://www.pdfforge.org/

If you're using an HP printer, you can obtain drivers from here:

  HP Support and Drivers
  http://www.support.hp.com/