USB or Parallel for printer?

[jaggrey]

I just got an HP Photosmart P1000 printer which has both USB and parallel ports. I already have a parallel cable so I'm probably gonna use that, but I'll switch to USB if I'll see a difference.

Any thoughts?

 

[RedShirt]

Oh yeah! On my printer, if I print, my system becomes VERY VERY VERY sluggish with a parallel cable. If I click and drag a window bar, the printer will stop printing until I release, etc etc.

With USB I notice nothing when I print a document. It is so better. I have an HP 842c printer. I do not know if all printers respond that poorly with a parallel cable or not.

 

[NelsonMuntz]

I think that particular printer is set up to use both simultaneously. The reason for that is that it has the photo card readers built into it and those use the USB cable while the parallel cable is used to print. I believe in order to use all the features you need to have BOTH cables installed.

 

[mindiris]

Not sure what type of printer the PhotoSmart P1000 is, but I'd wager it's a ink jet.

I generally figure if the printer is the bottleneck, it doesn't matter a whole lot if it's USB or parallel. If you happen to print nothing but high resolution images and pages.... USB should be noticably faster. A full page of just text would probably yeild no major differences.

 

[Journeyman]

Presumably you bought this printer to print photos with... There's no way I'd want to wait to spool high-res images with a parallel connection. Ugh...

You spent the money on the printer... Spend the extra money - get the USB cable.

 

[RossMAN]

USB cable costs $4-$10, definitely print using USB unless you've run out of ports.

 

[gariig]

I'd use a USB cable. If I remember correctly the PhotoSmart line can also be used as a card reader. Don't quote me on this, but I seem to remember a HP representative saying that you could. I have a Xerox M750 and I don't really notice much of a difference except USB seems to be more of a pain then Parallel for installation(I've heard this follows for HPs as well). My understanding of USB is you will fill the buffer quicker, it won't affect print speeds by any significant matter, but your computer will do less work trying to fill the buffer. As the P1000 has 4 megs built in, you fill it quicker then a Parallel, but it won't change your speeds except shaving 1-10 seconds off.

Gariig

 

[Scouzer]

My old HP Printer used a Parralel cable and it slugged my system so slow I could type '0's and '1's faster then it was...my new Z32 USB is MUCCH better!