• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

100 percent CPU usage when printing

M

Mapidus

Senior member
Hi,

On my w2k system when printing the cpu usage goes up to 100%. I think this is due to standard parallel port transfer. This is on a celeron 550. I did not know that SPP transfers were that intensive. Would EPP or ECP help since they use DMA? Has anyone had success using EPP/ECP over an 8 ft standard parallel cable? I don't really want to spend 20 dollars on an IEEE certified cable, and am not even sure if my printer suports these modes. It is not too bad nomally since most files are small, but sometimes I print files that have a 50+ meg spooled size and this takes several minutes to transfer.
 
What kind of printer do you have and do you know the size of the buffer in the printer? Also, your printer may be a "soft" printer, and not even have it's own processor to process jobs. If that's the case, that would be why it is using all of your CPU time. I have an Okidata 6e and use ECP. If you are sending huge 50+ meg files, that would bog down any printer, unless you have a professional business printer that is made to handle large jobs. My printer has 2MB of RAM and I've sent it jobs that were 40-50 pages in length and it never slowed down my old Celeron 300a @464 system. Actually for a few seconds when I first hit print, it locked up my system, but after that, I was free to do anything.
 
My printer is a hardware postscript printer, so the CPU usage is definitely not from having to drive a soft printer. Right now I have 3 megs in it. Looking to upgrade to 19 soon. I have another postscript printer with 20 megs, but it is hooked up to ethernet right now, so I can't test it out. I think it is likely the standard parallel transfer taking up the CPU time since it is PIO instead of DMA, but just can't imaging how many times per second it must be polling the port to take up 100% of a Celeron 550. I want to use ECP or EPP, but in the past I had timeout problems that I think are due to the cable not being one of the 20 dollar IEEE types.
 
If you have a spare PC laying around, even a 486, you could simply connect your printer to the spare and share the printer on your LAN.
 
Yeah, parallel uses 100% CPU, that's pretty common. Try a USB connection. I went from 100% while printing to 0-5% usage now. It's amazingly faster.

(went from a Lexmark Z11 to an Epson Stylus 880, FWIW.)
 
I have a paralell port/usb printer, and it bogged down big time when i printed through paralell port! then i tried USB, wow what a difference, system worked great while printing big files. Just spend the few extra bucks to get the IEEE standard cable......
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top