#Amiga Printing…
23 messages in this thread
Can anyone offer any tips on printing from the Amiga? Until recently, I've
never even had a printer hooked up to my 4000, and have done all my printing by
transferring everything over to the PC. Now that I've hooked up an HP DeskJet
550C to the 4000, I'm *still* having to print everything on the PC!
Here's what I've tried:
Found an Amiga driver for the 550C, and installed it in the drawer with all the
other printer drivers…
Went to the PREFS drawer, selected PRINTER, chose the 550C driver, selected
PRINTER GFX, plus the other 2 configurable printer-related icons, and set
everything up the way I wanted it…
Go to the TOOLS drawer, and double-click 'InitPrinter', then 'GraphicDump'…
Also tried "Print Area" from ImageMaster…
THE RESULTS: Page after page of sheets with nothing but a line of two of
unreadable garbage; continues until the printer is turned off…
Hints and tips, anyone?
Many thanks!
Jerry
Jerry,
Somebody told me that the Amiga only supports certain printers. My suggestion
would be to call HP. I just bought the 560C and they helped me with a printing
problem in about 2 minutes.
I'm printing off of the PC, and like you have never hooked up a printer to the
Amiga. I know that when we bought a Mac a number of years ago, and I wanted to
use our current laser printer, I had to buy a thing called a "grappler". It was
a divice that went between the Mac and the printer.
BTW, send me an S-VHS tape of anything that you want to see run through the
Flyer. I'll copy it into the Flyer, add some disolves and things and bring it
back out. Leave me room on the tape you send so that I can copy it on the same
tape.
Fred
Hello again Fred.
You'll find a host of drivers here on Compuserve, with really extensive
support for HP and Canon printers. As you may know, the Amiga uses a
standard PC type parallel printer cable (except for the A1000), so it is
pretty much a plug'n'print.
There are two ports to reference when addressing the printer. PAR:
bypasses the printer driver selected in Preferences and dumps the file to
the port. This would be used if the file is a data stream with printer
commands already in it. Using PRT: invokes the printer driver for some
formatting by Preferences settings.
By the way, there is also a trap command called CMD in the Tools drawer
which redirects the next file to be printer to a data file in RAM:. Double
click the icon and the next "printed" file will go to RAM: with all
printer commands intact. The command then self cancels.
Hank
Videology, Inc Where you get all the P.O.M.P. under all
circumstances.
Henry,
<< There are two ports to reference when addressing the printer. PAR:
bypasses the printer driver selected in Preferences and dumps the file to
the port. This would be used if the file is a data stream with printer
commands already in it. Using PRT: invokes the printer driver for some
formatting by Preferences settings. >>
How do you redirect the printer through the PRT: instead? GraphicDump offers
no options, and I haven't found any options in Imagemaster either…
Thanks,
Jerry
Jerry:
I have to jump in.
This should really be a matter of plug-n-play. I think the most likely
problem is that the dipswitches aren't set properly on your HP, or you
have a bad cable. I've been using a 500C on my A4000 for a number of
months now, and it works just fine.
For starters, have you verified that you can print text with it?
Select the 'Generic' printer driver from the 'Printer' prefs tool. Next,
use a text editor to print a sample, or type the following from a shell
prompt: 'printfiles s:startup-seuquence'
(This is where redirection comes in handy, you could also type:
'copy >PRT: s:startup-sequence' and it does the same thing.)
If your printer is hooked up correctly, you should see a text file printed
out.
If you don't get anything, try hooking the printer up to a PC. (There
ought to be one of those around. :^) Try printing from the PC. If this
doesn't work, then I would suggest you verify the dip switch settings are
correct. You should find a list of settings on the underside of the
cartridge cover area.
If all else fails, get the Studio drivers by Wolf Faust – available from
Noahji's. I've got the Super_DJC2 drivers, and they work, but they're a
real pain to figure out how to use.
BTW, have you checked your manual for info? There's a fairly informative
section on how to setup printers in there.
Anyway, I hope some of this might have helped.
Good Luck!
Oh, BTW,…..the Amiga is limited to 4096 colors when printing. The best
results I've gotten thus far are by using the free v5.0 Win driver on the
PC…….:^(
Keep On Toastin'
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
Erik,
Thanks for the tips. After I removed the little automatic A/B switch that was
supposed to allow the printer to be shared by the PC and the Amiga, it *was* a
plug-n-play operation.
Of course, the quality of the color graphics being printed out of the Amiga
definitely leave a lot to be desired, but I haven't had a chance to tinker with
any settings yet, either..
Jerry
Jerry –
Congratulations!! Although the Amiga supports only 4096 colors, some
drivers, like ASDG (ER)'s Primera Dye-Sub printer, can get 16 million. The
potential output on the HP is great.
Hank
Videology, Inc Where you get all the P.O.M.P. under all
circumstances.
Hank,
Thanks for the help!
Jerry
I played with some of the shareware drivers available last year, and
couldn't get anything decent. Wolf's StudioII drivers seem to get good
reviews, though. Best of luck!
Glad everything worked!
Keep On Toastin'
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
Erik,
What driver did you say you were using for your DeskJet on the PC? The best
output I've ever achieved on the PC, after tinkering with settings endlessly
over the past 6 months, is mediocre…
Thanks,
Jerry
I'm just using the latest HP driver (v5.0) with their 'ColorSmart'
feature. (It supposedly alters the print options automatically for
whatever type of information being printed. ie:text, photo, solid colors,
etc.) You can get it from the HPPER libs here on CIS.
Probably the biggest improvement in color comes from using the custom
paper. Using the 'HP Special Paper' causes colors to be much deeper and
more vibrant. I've printed a few on the 'HP Glossy Paper' (at $1/sheet!
Yikes!), and the image colors are almost _more_ vibrant than some dye sub
printers I've used. (The HP inks have an almost flourescent quality,
making them brighter.)
Of course, it is an inkjet printer, and as such will always suffer from
visible pixels of ink. Dye Sublimation will always look better, but I've
gotten very good results from careful color selection and using good
paper.
Oh well, good luck!
Keep On Toastin'
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
Erik,
Thanks; I downloaded all 671K of that 5.0 driver file last night, and it does
work better than the one that came with the printer.
You're absolutely right about the paper making an incredible difference. I've
scoured my town for the HP papers, and there are simply none to be found. I'll
go ahead and get some from Viking Office Supply. I ordered some generic inkjet
paper from them a while back, and while it doesn't even approach the HP papers,
*especially* that $1/page glossy stock, it is better than standard copy paper.
Until now, I just haven't had the need for the high-priced paper, but have a
project going on now that demands some quality output.
Jerry
Glad to have helped!
For _really_ good prints, I've had to move it over to the PC. :^(
I'm using the Super_DJC driver on the Amiga – It's a pain to use, only
supports 1/2tone dithering, and has all kinds of offset/margin problems.
I've heard good things about Wolf's StudioII drivers, but since I found
the PD HP Drivers for the PC…..
Keep On Toastin'
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
Jerry,
I had a similar problem once. Tried all the software fixes, took it to
the dealer. They said it was the CIA chips (8250s, maybe?).
I got lucky, though, it was just a bent pin on the port. It did exactly
what you describe, though I'm sure there are other possible causes.
Good luck.
Kent
Thanks, Kent. If it's hardware problems, I'll just keep printing on the PC…
🙁
Jerry
###########
Can anyone offer any tips on printing from the Amiga? Until recently, I've
never even had a printer hooked up to my 4000, and have done all my printing by
transferring everything over to the PC. Now that I've hooked up an HP DeskJet
550C to the 4000, I'm *still* having to ###################
Funny you should ask. A few days ago I posted a similar question on the
IBM/Lexmark forum (I have a Lexmark 4039 laser printer that I want to use with
my Amiga). The response that I got from the SysOp is that the Amiga parallel
port is not strong enough to push my printer….the signal levels are not
strong enough…and that I would either get garbage out, or no communication at
all. His sugestion was to connect serially (but how to do that is still a TBD
for me).
Nick
Nick,
<< the signal levels are not strong enough…and that I would either get
garbage out, or no communication at all. His sugestion was to connect serially
(but how to do that is still a TBD for me). >>
Uh oh. My serial port is definitely used up already, and rather than go to the
hassle of adding another, I'll just keep printing everything on the old PC.
Sure would be nice to be able to print pictures right from the Amiga, though…
Anyone else have any suggestions?
Thanks,
Jerry
Jerry,
How you been, guy?
As for the Amiga parallel port not having enough 'push', I don't believe
that. Too many other things run too well for this not to have been a big
deal earlier.
Check the parallel port pins for bent ones, and look around here for some
print drivers to use. Also, instead of graphic dump, try printing
directly from AdPro if you have it, as it will try to do full 24-bit
printing. Even DPaint should work fine, maybe even TPaint.
This really shouldn't be that big of a problem, and I don't want to see
you wear out your shoes moving those floppies back and forth…
That garbage you see is the printer actually putting out the ASCII version
of each of the bytes the Amiga is sending it. Lotsa wierd characters and
carriage returns in it. Probably some backfeeds which'll drive an inkjet
wacko. The driver/software you are using needs to convert this info to
graphic commands for the printer. Make sure that 'verbatum' ISN'T
selected as one of the options.
If you still want to try, I've got some print drevers for the HP series on
a shareware CD-ROM that I could send along (with docs and registration
forms, of course) that just may help.
Regards.
Nate Wahl
Emerald Video
Nate,
On the printing problem, see my note to Erik…
As far as how I've been: Been awful busy. In addition to all the traditional,
exciting jobs for clients like videos for software training, furniture promos,
etc., I've spent a lot of time over the past several months on my first project
to market myself, which is a one hour documentary/educational/travel guide
video on the Natchez Trace Parkway.
How's it going?
Jerry
Jerry: Just picked up on this thread. This may sound dumb, but have you
tried a shorter printer cable?
FWIW: I'm using Wolf Faust's commercial Studio Printer Drivers for my HP
DeskJet Portable, but I do very little graphics printing with it. (It's
B&W, but can print graphics)
Trent/ReAnimators
Trent,
It turned out to be that the Amiga is just incompatible with the little
automatic A/B switch; removed it and it works just fine, though the graphics
printing leaves a bit to be desired!
Thanks,
Jerry
Glad to hear the problem's fixed Jerry. I actually knew about auto A/B's
being incompatible – sorry I didn't pick it out of your original message.
Trent/ReAnimators
Nicholas,
Don't believe it about the parallel port signal levels being weak.
I used to push the signals through a 25' parallel cable to a Varityper 2400 dpi
imagesetter.
In all the years I've used Amigas and have been in this forum I've never heard
any complain that the parallel port has weak signal strength.
Christopher