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Printer Connection Problem?

C

Carbo

Diamond Member
Running W2K Pro SP2. I have a HP DeskJet 952C printer, about 6 months old, connected via a USB port. It had been working fine until about a month ago when one day I noticed a considerable time lag from when I pushed the print button until it actually began printing. For example, a two page Word document would take, perhaps, four minutes before the printer would begin. Once it did print, the job was quick and clear but, man, that time lag. Since then I have uninstalled and reinstalled the latest driver many times with no improvement.
When I install the driver I always click on print a test page. The page prints out immediately and perfectly. I don't think this is a hardware problem. I can't see how it's a driver problem. What does that leave?
Something with the connection? A bad cable?
I'm stumped and I need the printer back up to snuff. The system log file says:
"Document failed to print due to GDI/Driver error in rendering." Huh?
And I've noticed that whenever the printer is turned on the CPU usage hits 100% and remains there until the job begins to print.
I've been sure to turn off all unnecessary applications running in the background.
My system should be sufficient: PIII 500MHz,
384MB RAM.
I'm stumped. Any takers?
 
Welcome to the wonderful world of HP Printers, Carbo.
I've got the 952C also with the two sided adapter running Win98SE on one computer and now recently W2k Pro SP2 on a DDR mobo with 384mb of PC2100 DDR memory.
HP will blame slow print start ups from low memory resources. HP has stated repeatedly that when resources drop below 80% the print job may not print.
I have better success printing, especially while online, by using the corporate drivers listed for the printer. You will loose the ability to see your print cartridge level in the tool box but many of the problems with the drivers are related to that and low memory resources.
Try the corporate drivers and also shut down some running programs before trying to print.
I have also found that installing IE 5.5 with service pack 1 fixes some memory leaks if you use IE 5.5.
Yesterday I installed the HP 970C corporate drivers to see if performance improved. I still get about a 50 second delay only when trying to print a web page full of graphics. A web page with moderate graphics will start to print in about 15 seconds. Just a text document should start within 5 - 10 seconds.
You should try installing the printer using the parallel cable. I find USB just too buggy to depend on it for printing. Be sure to go into the BIOS and set the parallel port for ECP. Avoid using ECP+EPP. Good luck!
 
Hi, Blue. Interesting that HP should blame this problem on low memory resources. I don't see how that's a factor in my case, though, because I can reboot, for example, have no other applications running in the background, and a one page Word document, text only, no graphics, will not begin to print for perhaps as long as three minutes. Clearly, something is wrong.
I'm planning to try the parallel cable this weekend, but I understand that usually a USB connection is preferable. Now that you mention it, I think the problems began when I upgraded to HP's latest driver, version 3.1, released on 4/30/01. I wonder if I can find the previous version driver and go back to that? Sometimes latest and greatest ain't necessarily so.
 
A quick update for someone's future reference. The issue has been resolved with the assistance of the moderator at HP's community forum. He suggested I have a look here .
I did and, in my case it was simply a matter of increasing the maximum registry size from the default of 55MB, to 60MB. Then, I also lowered the printer priority from 1 to 12. The printer is responding like a roach on crack again. Hope this helps someone, sometime.
 
Interesting article with some interesting settings to change.
I've tried the 970 drivers but windows keeps wanting to install the 952 drivers everytime I reboot.
Gonna try the settings changes and thanks for the link.
 
Went back to the 952C corporate drivers and made the changes.
Trying to print a loaded web page usually started after about 50 seconds.
Now it starts after about ten seconds. Looks like those changes made the difference.
I'm beginning to like HP again.
 
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