Whats faster: USB or Parrallel Printing??

[le3tplaya]

I have an HP P1000 photo printer, just wondering.

 

[dullard]

Here is an HP link for another one of its printers describing the different bandwidths of parallel and USB:
link.

Connection type Transfer rate (Megabytes/second)
Serial Port .115
Standard Parallel Port .115
USB 1.0/1.1 Low Speed 0.1875
USB 1.1 Full Speed 1.5
ECP parallel port 3.0
IEEE1394 (Firewire) 50.0
USB 2.0 Hi-Speed 60.0

Basically if you have a ECP parallel printer and computer and operating system, it is double the current USB bandwidth.

 

[dullard]

I forgot to mention: double the bandwidth may do nothing to print speeds. It depends on the printers capability. If it can handle 2.0 MB/sec then you probably will get faster printing with ECP parallel. However if the printer can only handle 1.0 MB/sec then you will see no speed difference.

My printer is an HP laserjet 1200. It prints about 8 pages/min with parallel and 6-7 pages/min with USB. So I always assume it has maxed out the USB bandwidth at 6-7 pages/min. On the other hand, it has been pointed out that HP MIGHT just have poor USB support for my printer and so I have no proof if it hit the USB limit.

 

[oldfart]

I had an odd thing with my HP 970 when using the parallel port. While printing, my PIII 1 Gig system would crawl along at a 286 speed. I could barely move the mouse. I had latest drivers yada yada. I checked the printers Usenet group and many people had the same problem. The fix was to go USB, which did work. I never had this problem with the Epson printers, although I'm finally free from clogged print heads. I mention this because you ask about an HP printer. I dont know if your model would have the same issue.

 

[Pabster]

Printing via Parallel Port has always been taxing on the CPU. It isn't uncommon to see 90-100% processor useage in such a configuration. USB has a lower maximum thoroughput, but it is much, much easier on the CPU.