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Computing  Network Printers  A0 Colour Printer

Introduction

Professor Parker's research group owns a Hewlett Packard DesignJet 800 42" colour printer. This is suitable for printing posters, as an alternative to the OUCS and Physics printers. The group have allowed other members of the department to use it, and Dr. Stuart Gilson has agreed to manage print submissions from members of the department for a trial period.

Details

• The printer is currently in room A64. Physical access to the printer may be restricted.
• Printer resolution is 600dpi (dots per inch); you can match the resolution of your graphics files to this value.
• The printer does not have a Postscript interface, although submissions may be sent in postscript format, as well as in other formats:
  File Formats
  • A Postscript printer file (.ps, .eps) created with Generic Postscript printer driver software. See Creating a Printer File. This is the recommended method.
  • An HPGL printer file (.hpgl) created with the HP printer driver software. See Creating a Printer File (but files created this way are difficult to preview before printing).
  • Portable Document Format .pdf (made with Adobe Acrobat or the unix ps2pdf command). A good method.
  • Standard bitmap formats .tiff, .bmp etc. (.jpg can be printed but will often appear pixellated when reproduced on large paper)
  • Program specific formats (.ppt, .doc etc.) can not be submitted. Instead, print to a file using either a generic postscript printer driver or the specific HP printer driver software.
• The printer is not connected to the network; submissions must be sent directly to Stuart Gilson using the method below. Do not email him your file as an attachment.
  Submitting Print Jobs
  • Email some days ahead, so that you know that the printing service is available
  • Use the Anonymous File Transfer service to upload your prepared printer file
  • Email stuart.gilson@physiol.ox.ac.uk with both the reference number from your upload, and a grant code to pay for the paper and ink used.
• To cover costs, there will be a charge of £25 per A0/B0 page. Lower quality or smaller Draft copies may be requested at lower cost.
• Printouts can be made on semi-gloss paper, or on matt paper (for those who wish to laminate posters elsewhere)
• Printing time for an A0 poster is about 3 hours, including preparation time.

Getting It Done On Time

• It is possible that Stuart will be unable to print a poster due to other commitments. It is suggested, therefore, that people should email a few days or a week in advance that they would like to print something. This will give Stuart the chance to schedule his time, or to suggest alternative arrangements. Do not turn up on a Friday afternoon expecting your poster to be printed for the next day!
• It would be very useful (and may save problems later) to submit a part-completed copy of your poster or print job a few days in advance. This is to check that the file is readable and there is no problem in rendering it. You will not be charged for this.
• Print jobs submitted before lunch will be available for collection later that same day.
• Print jobs submitted after lunch normally will be available for collection the next working day.

Submitting Print Jobs

There is a method of transferring the printer files without clogging up personal email. The Anonymous File Transfer service at http://www.physiol.ox.ac.uk/xfer/ was designed to allow people from outside the department to upload files for people working here, but it will work equally well inside the department.

The person sending the printer file selects "Upload files", browses to their file and selects the Send button. They then make a note of the reference number given to them on the upload page and email stuart.gilson@physiol.ox.ac.uk quoting this number. To get at the file, Stuart would have to select the "Download files" link from http://www.physiol.ox.ac.uk/xfer/ and enter his Physiology username and password and the reference number.

To account for the cost of consumables such as ink and paper, the person sending the print job will have to email Stuart an account code for charging as well as the access code mentioned above.

Preparing a Printer File

You may send any of the common file formats listed in the Details section. However, you may also print to a file and submit the result.

To create a printer file to submit to the printer, you must have suitable printer driver software installed on your PC (Mac and Unix users already have Postscript printer drivers). Once installed you don't need to do it again - just print your work to a file.

Installing the printer driver software

Windows Generic Colour Postscript Printer Driver (recommended)
1. Download the Adobe PostScript driver installation program. A good place to store it is in C:\temp.
2. Right click and Save this Generic Colour PostScript PPD file. A good place to store it is in C:\temp. Take care if using Internet Explorer as this may add a spurious .txt extension to the saved file name.
3. Double-click the Adobe PostScript driver installation file you downloaded to run it.
4. In the install dialogue, choose Local Printer. Choose an output port of FILE if the output is to be written to disk by default.
5. Choose a printer model of Generic Colour PostScript which is derived from your downloaded PPD file. You may need use the Browse button to find the downloaded PPD file.
6. When prompted to configure the printer, you can choose a default paper size.

Windows HPGL Printer Driver
1. From the Windows "Start" button, navigate to "Settings"->"Printers"
2. Double-click "Add Printer", then click the "Next" button
3. Select "Local Printer" and click "Next"
4. Click on the "Have Disk" button, then the "Browse" button
5. Navigate to the printer drive files on the N: drive, in the folder N:\DRIVERS\hp\hp_designjet_800
6. Choose the folder for your version of Windows 9xME, NT or 2kXP then click on the "OK" button
7. Click "OK", then from the list of printers, select "HP DesignJet 800 42 by HP"
8. Click "Next" button
9. From the list of printer ports, select "FILE:"
10. Click "Next", then the "Finish" button

Printing to a file

It doesn't matter which program you are using, as long as you can print you can create a printer file to upload.

Windows
1. Make sure your page layout is correct. In your program, use "Page Layout" from the "File" menu if necessary.
2. Select "Print" from your program's "File" menu
3. Select either the "Generic Colour Postscript" printer or the "HP DesignJet 800 42 by HP" printer (depending on which printer software you installed).
4. Use the printer "Properties" button to set print quality and other parameters
5. Click "OK", then choose a filename and a folder for the file. It would be useful to use the file extensions .ps (for the Generic Postscript software) or .hpgl (for the HP DesignJet software).
6. Upload the file using http://www.physiol.ox.ac.uk/xfer/ then email Stuart with the upload reference number.

Paper Sizes

For reference, some popular ISO standard paper sizes have these dimensions in millimetres:

Reference source: International Standard Paper Sizes

Colour Matching

The colours you see on the print output will not necessarily match those you see on the screen when composing your document. The characteristics of both screens and printers are different, especially since screens rely on a mix of red, green, & blue light, whereas printers rely on the mixing of four or more pigments.

Although printers and screens can be calibrated to a colour reference (a Pantone table), each technology can only allow an approximation of some colours.

Please be aware that some colours will not print as expected.

Drivers and Colour Tables for the HP DesignJet 800 Printer

Printer Manuals

• Pocket Guide (PDF format)
• User's Reference Guide (PDF format)