Strangest printing issue ever!

[jwarmuth]

I'm been troubleshooting this issue for sometime now and feel I have arrived at a conclusion, however would like a second opinion (or more).


This began with the replacement of a printer on a clients PC (running XP pro SP2). They upgraded their older HP laser printer (connected via parallel) to a new All-in-one Lexmark (connected via USB). Since changing to the new printer, all print jobs print off center to the bottom of the page. I checked and tweaked ALL possible settings and options in Windows in regards to print settings.

At first I thought it's just the printer or drivers, so I upgraded the drivers and tested the printer on another PC. Replacing the drivers did nothing, but moving it to another PC showed the printer was fine. However due to poor print quality, we decided to change the printer anyway. So I brought in a new HP all-in-one printer (again, USB). While the print quality cleared up, it still printed off center to the bottom of the page. Strange considering it's a completely new manufacturer with new and different software.

Hmmmph! Must be windows. So I reinstalled Windows using all the newest and greatest drivers. Problem still exists! Must be hardware. Possibly the USB controller, so I replaced that with a new one. Problem still exists.

I'm stumped now. Two different printers, a reinstalled OS and a new USB controller and this PC still prints off center.

I believe it's just a bad motherboard or mobo drivers. Second opinions? TIA!

Jeff W.
MCSE, CNE

 

[garebo]

Holy moly! I had a similar problem but all i had to do was re-set settings in wordpad to minimum or default, something like that, and problem went away. However, since you have re-installed windows i dont know. Guess you could still try that, wouldnt hurt, and you likely have already tried that.
Weird problem indeed.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[garebo]

I would go with bad drivers before the mobo, but thats only a guess. But if the rest of the mobo is working fine, i would go with bad drivers.
How about a bios setting? I dont even know if there is a bios setting for usb printer, as there is for parallel port.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[micker377]

Does the printer "self test" print OK? Did you completely remove the old HP printer and drivers? What programs are you trying to use to print?

 

[jwarmuth]

All the old drivers/settings were wiped when I formatted and reinstalled windows.

As for apps, it does it in all apps. You can create a new document in Word 2003, then create a page border and select print; it will return an error that the page it outside the printable area. WTH?!!! <--- what I was thinking

So for some reason, the system KNOWS waht the printable area is, yet cannot do anything about it. Same thing happens in other apps such as Adobe Reader.


Hmm... in reiterating that I feel more like it's a driver issue of the mobo drivers. Still wonky though.

Jeff W.
MCSE, CNE

 

[mainegeek]

jwarmuth,
Maybe check with the mobo mfg website for driver or bios update.

 

[BadBigBen]

Hi there, have you checked the Printer Properties (go to the printer subpanel and right click on the said printer) as to yet?

there you might find that the Paper size (Legal or A4) are set...

Legal size is about 8,5 inches in width and 11,5 in length, as to A4 it's size is about 8,2 inches in width and only 10,5 inches long... so having the wrong paper size set, could lead all apps to print offcenter!!!!





Ben

If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer...

 

[jwarmuth]

No that would cause printing to run off the page, different from printing off center. Also, I went through ALL the print settings. I even tried every single print processor available.



Jeff W.
MCSE, CNE

 

[G0AOZ]

Not familiar with your printer, but are there any settings within the printer itself which could conceivably need resetting?

You also didn't answer micker377's suggestion about running a test print...

Papertray guides all manually set correctly for the size of paper? And just for interest, what size of paper are you using?

I assume the same problem occurs if you try to print landscape instead of portrait?


ROGER - G0AOZ.

 

[BadFrog]

Thats a strange one indeed! Does the new printer have a parallel port? If it does I would be curious to see if the problem existed via the parallel port. I'm sure you've probably already tried a different USB cable. I havn't worked with USB printing much but from the sounds of things I would be looking very hard at the USB part of this problem and trying to isolate there.

"Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy"
Albert Einstein

 

[jwarmuth]

Just to clarify, I've been through all the printer page size settings, margin settings, etc (that was all part of step one). I've also checked the page feed guides on the printers themselves. Keep in mind, that this issue has been occuring on TWO different printers from TWO different manufacturers. Also, I formatted and reinstalled the OS, so there are NO old settings/drivers left to be of issue. I did obtain all the newest drivers available for the motherboard and peripherals as well.

I've spent about 16 hours on this issue so far and can confidently say all the easy/basic stuff has been checked. I even changed out the USB cable AND redirected the wiring to account for environmental factors.

As for self tests, they print okay. The machince can also recieve faxes and print properly. This issue definitely stems from the PC, not the printers.

Jeff W.
MCSE, CNE

 

[garebo]

Then how about simply re-installing windows over top of itself. If the problem is windows that may very well fix it.


Good advice + great people = tek-tips

 

[FutureL]

Very strange!

Have you tryed a diferent usb port on the pc?

 

[mainegeek]

Probably related to the bios and usb. Have you upgraded the bios?