print jobs getting stuck
i am going to repost this because my previous post had gotten so old that it was getting buried: 
we have been having random issues with our printers (all of them). i will try and make this as easy to explain as possible.
- we do not have a print server. all printers have an ip address and all computers connect directly to them by ip. 
- this can happen even if only one person is connected to a printer so it is not different jobs colliding.
- we have a mixture of brother, hp and konica minolta printers.
- all printers randomly will get something stuck in their queue and we will have to clear that before anyone can print to that device.
- we have tried updating the drivers, firmware, uninstalling and reinstalling and disabling av. 
- this happens on all computers and we have a mixture of dell optiplex 755s and lenovo m73 usff.
- all computers are windows 7 x64 pro
- this happens at every office as well (we have 5 different offices consisting of around 10 different switches and 3 different models and 2 different brands of switches).
- this can happen even if it is just a windows test page. 
- if you watch the print queue, you will see the job progress up to within a few bytes of the entire amount and then just stop even though it has printed. after that it will sit there for up to 10 minutes or until we clear it out.
- this seems to be happening only since we swapped/upgraded all of our computers from windows xp to windows 7.












any ideas why jobs would get stuck or how we can prevent this in the future?﻿
just a heads up. i believe we found the solution. as far as we could tell, these issues began to happen after we moved everything to windows 7. however, one of the helpdesk people said they thought they remembered it happening once before that while the computers were still all xp. 
i looked into the av, which was moved to a different server and upgraded shortly before our windows 7 project began. evidently, trend's migration tool that was used did not migrate over port exceptions in the firewall. after adding a few recommended exceptions to the firewall, everything started to work. 
it seems that the client firewall was blocking return snmp traffic from the printer which was keeping the computer from realizing that printing had completed. this was keeping the connection open to the printer preventing anything else from printing on that computer or any others connected to it. 
the ports added as exceptions were: udp 161(probably the only one needed), tcp 9100, 9220, 9500.
HP have indeed recently released a firmware update that disabled the use of some remanufactured/compatible units. We have however since then sourced alternative stock, designed to work with these firmware updates. Any printer found listed on this page is guaranteed to work and we are always more than happy to help if you ever have any future issues. I don't know that printer. But Arduino has a feature that a USB connection causes a reset. The Idea is that this helps when doing software update as the Arduino Boot loader will be active for one second after that reset.

 This can be disabled, but needs hardware modification. Windows 7 can be configured as both host and client for the printer sharing. I assume that you want to use your Windows 7 for the client printing connection.   
  
Here are some of the steps to make the connection from Windows 7 as a printer.   
  
1. Click on start button and go to control panel.   
2. Go to network and sharing center.   
3. Go to Change Advanced Sharing Settings.   
4. Find out the home or the private network under which this computer has access to other computers.   
5. Click on the network with which you want to share printer as a host or client.   
6. Find the option for printer sharing in settings.   
7. Turn on the option "File and Printer Sharing".   
8. Save the changes.   
9. Reboot the system.   
  
This takes few seconds usually but some of the time reboot is required if the network is not properly detected. So you have to go through the above steps unless proper network is established.   
  
If it is asking for username and password for the public network, then you have to provide if it was set during the home or private network sharing options. If it is not set, then you have to reset the network sharing options at host and then reconnect your client machine for printer sharing. Yes, there are KVM switches that support multiple monitors. do a search for multi-display KVM.


with regard to send print jobs to the printer, the best approach is probably going to be to buy a wireless printer and hook it up on your local network. Download and install the 64-bit driver for the printer. If this is an old printer, check with the manufacturer to see if they have a 64-bit driver. > 
> But how is this achieved?
> 
> 
> 


The system is not perfect. I personally do not like a lot of dumb decisions they made. But the basic idea is that they have:


* A catalog of consistent **printed** colors.
* A set of base colors and the **formulas** to achive the derivated colors.
* The base colors have some **specific values on colorimetry** that are repeatable by diferent manufacturers of inks.



> 
> I assume there are no "Pantone Inks", right?
> 
> 
> 


Yes and no. **Pantone is the system** to have a consistent color. Then, diferent **ink manufacturers** make a set of base inks based on the specifications.


So a manufacturer "HappyInks Inc." make an ink, for example "Pantone Reflex Blue"


**Printers** then go to the formula guide to find the recipy for the colors on the catalog, and go and buy from "Happy Inks" the basic set of colors.


They combine "Pantone Reflex Blue" with "Pantone Sunrise Yellow" in some specified proportions (from the pantone formula guide) to achive "Green XXXc".


If you are going to need a lot of ink of one specific color, the printer do not mix the base inks themselves, but ask for "Happy Inks" to make them some kilos of the ink (based, again on the pantone specifications).


The quality of diferent brands can be more or less accurate. Besides that some characteristics of inks can differ because some could be oriented to silk print, or textiles etc.



> 
> the printer needs in RGB.
> 
> 
> 


This is a biiiiiig mistake.


RGB is not by any means an acurate color reference. Either your printer is lazy or he is simply using some kind of digital print (but still is ignorant(*).


You need to include a RGB profile. Either sRGB or Adobe 1998 but you need to design using a CMYK profile, which obviously you do not have. So ask for which one is more suitable for that.


If they have no idea or say something like "It does not matter" use one according to your location. SWOP 2, Fogra, Gracol, etc.



> 
> Will the colours vary too much if using a Pantone - RGB convertor?
> 
> 
> 


If the project is on flat inks, the proper step would be that you deliver a project in Pantone and let them do the conversions, so they are responsable to match the color the best way possible.


This is why I say they are Ignorant. (*) They ignore what is the calibration of their own machine. They should profile it and give you some clues on what "generic profile" suits them the most.



> 
> textile print
> 
> 
> 


This does not say much. Are you printing rolls and rolls of fabric? Are you printing a Tshirt on a digital medium, like a logo for a student party? Are you using silk print for the campain for a company?


**An Aditional note**



> 
> will the colours vary too much
> 
> 
> 


Colors vary for a looooooooot of reasons.


My clasic example, grab a water based cyan marker. You have a specific ink one and only one.


Now go an paint everywhere you want. A news paper, a magazine, a window, a white towel, toilet paper, your hand.


See? The exact same ink vary a lot. This is why you must have an output color profile, so this gives the internal conversions and calculations to have the most acurate color possible due this combination of factors, which color on which medium.


This is why the printer should be responsable for the color conversions.


**Aditional Note 2**


There are some conversions from pantone to cmyk and rgb... Ouch.


This are very specific conversions. On some "ideal" situations.


More or less how an ink will be printed following exact specifications, for example a CMYK: type of paper, type of inks, controlled ammount of them (densitometry), etc.


For an RGB one they assume a calibrated monitor, Correct gamma, correct temperature, sRGB profile. But again this rgb simulation is for output for a web page for example, not as a printable file.


Spot color (Pantone), or Color selection (CMYK)



Depending on the type of design you have the choice to print in either of this 2 color modes.


For example, a design with gradients and diferent colors most likely needs to be printed in color selection.


But some other type of design needs to be printed with spot inks, or direct colors, this reduces costs and aditionally allow the colors to be consistent


[![](https://otake.com.mx/Foros/Directa.jpg)](https://otake.com.mx/Foros/Directa.jpg) yikes, this can cause the damper film to stick together and result in “damper lock” . . . .

i suggest refill, open the front cover and trick the leaf switch so the front cover can remain open.

run a powerful cleaning on the channel pair and watch for ink movement. it should go pretty fast. contin… have added psu to above post. (i added specs because i knew someone would ask. however i think it's a software issue.)

unlikely that it's the psu.

the current psu is a hx750i, and the previous psu was a hx650i. swapped over a year ago at least. this is a recent issue.


good, a lot of times this is the psu. but with an excellent unit, that's far less likely.

were you monitoring temperatures at the time? was there something specific you were doing similar in both times? really intermittent things can be hard to nail down. hi, thank you for the help.

we were able to find the issue by comparing with the workstation of one of our coworker not having this issue. the character “é” from the file location was causing it to bug as it is a special character. we have had to change our computers language settings from french t… fax modems were developed decades ago. their design makes use of the fact that fax signals are merely audio tones sent along a normal telephone line, so re-designing a regular data modem to also be able to send faxes using the same phone capabilities was relatively simple.

these days you can buy a data modem either as an external box that connects to your computer via a port and cable, or as a card you can install in a pci or pcie slot. then you connect it to a phone line. becasue the addition of fax capabilites became so easy and commonplace, almost all data modems actually include that feature and are sold as fax modems. the drivers supplied with them allow your computer to use either type of service. many people do not install one of these because they have no intention of using a modem on a phone line - they prefer much faster data rates available by connections though the internet. so, unless they need fax abilities, nobody uses them anymore.

your interest seems to be mainly sending (and receiving?) faxes, and perhaps not even trying to use a data modem. current versions of windows make this really easy - you will not use your old winfax pro. windows includes all the tools you need to receive faxes in various ways, depending on whether you want your machine to always watch for incoming faxes, or only when you turn on the feature. for sending a fax it's even easier. windows always includes a system that makes a fax sending unit appear to be just another printer. you can "print" to that printer just as any other. when you do that, a window pops up to let you set a few parameters and then its sends the fax for you. it even includes a little utility to keep track of fax numbers that you can send to.

i used a fax modem infrequently on my last machine, and i really liked it. for one thing, the fax the recipient gets is really clean and readable, with no distortions or dirt specs caused by scanning. (actually, you can scan a document and then "print" it as a fax you send to someone.) but i used it rarely, and in my new machine there is no spare pci slot for the fax modem, so i never moved my old one to the new computer.