Printing to HP500

[Herman]

I'm trying to print to the HP 500 and it is blocking text and/or not printing them out at all. Not sure what to do...maybe driver problem?

Win 2000

VW 10

[Herman]

Katie-

Any news regarding the print driver/memory issue

for the HP 500 series plotters?

[Guest]

No.

This is not an issue that can be investigated and come to terms with overnight. It's a large scale issue between OS, printers, printer drivers and our application across a wide variety of Opearting Systems.

This is also not the only printing issue our engineer is currently looking into.

As soon as I hear something, I'll be sure to post it here.

[George Cocea]

I don't know if this is going to help but when I experienced the same behavior with plotting on an 800ps running Win2k I concluded that this occurs only when the "Zoom line weights" was not

selected.

What caught my attention (at least at my end) was that all the lineweights were the same. I don't know if everyone else is experiencing the same but this is what works for me.

The HP driver I use in the non-ps version 5.02 on Win2K SP3 over a ethernet connection.

[Herman]

Thanks Katie....just checking.....Honestly, thanks for a the hard work.

[Cameron Murdoch]

Katie,

I appreciate that this is a complex issue, but the architects I work for are losing significant time and money because of it. In addition to the text problem some people can't even print certain drawings. One of the architects has spent much of today trying unsuccessfully print a drawing and can't get any other work done.

As mentioned before, none of these problems occurred in VW8. The upgrade to VW10, which cost us a not inconsiderable amount of money has made life far harder for my company. Downgrading to VW8 is also not an option as a file created in VW10 but saved in VW8 format still exhibits the same printing problems.

I am sure that the printer engineer has many things to consider and investigate but at the moment this problem is seriously affecting our business and we are not even that busy at the moment. In a few weeks/months when a large project is due to start the current situation will be unacceptable.

Still thanks for all that you have done,

Cameron Murdoch

[Guest]

I understand this is a trying position for you.

Please note, printing methods have changec between vw 8 and 9 to allow a more accurate print mechanism as well as to allow for compatibility for Carbon Lib and OS 10.x.

Because of changes in technology external to VW, we also need to make changes to meet these challenges.

I assure you we are investigating the problem. As stated before, this is not something that is fixed over night. It may take a few months to address, it may only take a few weeks. It's hard to say. Yes the HP 500 and others with the related print driver is a high priority. There are other printers as well having different problems than this one, who's user's see their problem as a priority as you do yours.

Cameron, have you tried any of the suggested temporary fixes throughout this post ?

[ 01-28-2003, 02:56 PM: Message edited by: Katie ]

[Cameron Murdoch]

We have tried the suggestions that have been made without any real success. Some of them may have helped slightly but none have fixed the problem.

I understand that producing a large computer program is a difficult task and that conforming to multiple platforms, operating systems, etc is hard. I also understand that there will be other problems and I definitely understand that each person will regard his issue as the most important; I am a sysadmin after all!! However, my real problem here is that printing from vectorworks worked fine in version 8 and is broken in version 10. I don't want to become cliched but this increasingly feels like we have upgraded to software that is more buggy that what we already had.

Also, speaking as a customer, being told about other people's problems is not helpful. I paid for Vectorworks to perform a certain task which is does not do.

Improving the software is one thing, but breaking things that already worked is the sort of thing that annoys people.

Just some kind of timescale would be useful, and I am fully aware that problems like these are not easy to time. If it is going to be months then we will have to try and come up with a different plan of our own.

Cam

[Guest]

Our engineer is in contact with the HP engineer representative. They have a number of other customers they assist also. We are not the only customer they talk to.

Our engineering staff is only human. They can only work a certain number of hours in a day. I can assure you they are doing thier hardest to try and resolve this issue and others as quickly as possible. They need to manage their time just as effectively as you manage your time on projects so that EVERYONE's problems are resolved.

It is not possible to give you a time frame as we don't even know what the exact problem is. Until we hear back from HP's diagnosis of the information we have sent them, we don't know how to fix the problem within our code.

[ 01-28-2003, 04:21 PM: Message edited by: Katie ]

[Guest]

I have a few more questions about those that are having problems printing --

The drawings that are not printing, are they using a standard OS font, or another 3rd party font?

Are the plotters directly attached to your computers or do you access them across a network?

If over a network, please include as much information about the network configuration as possible.

[Cameron Murdoch]

The font we use is Ariel which I believe is a standard windows font. It might be installed with MS Office though - can't remember, so I will check.

The plotter is attached via the network. Our configuration is as follows:

HP DesignJet 800 (non ps) connected to TCP/IP network via build in Jetdirect card. This is a 10/100 Mb/sec card.

One of our Win2K servers (service pack 2) is set to print directly to the IP address of the plotter and then our clients print to the printer share on this server.

The print server is a well specified machine with 512Mb RAM and 1Gb/sec network connectivity.

All of the clients run Win2K professional (Service pack 3) and connect to the network at 100Mb/s.

Hope that helps.

Cam

[Guest]

The jetdirect card you have --

Do you know if you installed the latest firmware update as of 11 2002 ?

[mtcronin]

I'm working with HJ on this printing issue of the Design Jet 500 printing blocked letters, and saw his last post and thought I should add some more information to it so here goes.

We?re working on Windows 2000 Server SP3 network. All workstations that are having this problem have Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 installed with a combination of both Vector Works 9.5.2, and Vector Works 10. We?re running at 10/100 network switches at a full 100 per computer. Each computer has 10/100 3com network cards, or 10/100 Netgear cards installed. All Designers computers are P4s with 512 meg of memory installed with 4 gig hard drives installed.

The printer is printing over the HP standard TCP. The plotter has all the updated firmware for the jet direct card is installed. Should there be any additional questions you have regarding our network, printers or what ever let me know.

Regards,

Michael T. Cronin

[Cameron Murdoch]

Just tried printing to a file. It only produces a .ps file if you use that extension - remember my plotter is non-postscript.

I am not in the office at the moment so had to ring up to get somebody else to check the plot. It printed out ok but that might not mean anything seeing as sometimes things print fine anyway.

I will email some people in the office and get them to try tomorrow. (it is 6:30pm here).

What are we checking for here?

Cam

[Herman]

We used "Times New Roman" for a while hoping that would solve the problem, but it didn't. I'm now using Mr. Hand and Heavy Hand. I'll print to file ASAP and try that.

[Herman]

Katie-

We are using primarly the same system as noted above. Yes, we are using the latest update (jetdirect).

[ 02-05-2003, 12:07 PM: Message edited by: HJ ]

[Guest]

HJ,

What type of font do you use?

I noticed Mr. Hand and a tekton font and something else that wasn't familiar to me.

Do you ever use a standard OS font?

Everyone,

If you print to a file in VW (generates a .ps file), can you send it to the plotter and have it work?

[Cameron Murdoch]

Katie,

I have tried the 'print to a file' method and it hasn't helped. This is what I have done so far:

Printed a drawing normally until some kind of discrepancy appears, (ie blocked text or bits of the drawing missing) and then tried ie with the print to file method, which had little or no effect. There was one difference on one file though; when printed to a file some of the line widths were altered, and printed out fainter than they should do. Don't know if that helps, but I will keep trying.

Cam

[Guest]

If you can use a system font in the file and then send the file to me at tech@nemetschek.net, I can send it to HP for them to further evaluate.

They've been looking into the problem and haven't had any failures at printing VW files to these printers.

[Cameron Murdoch]

Is that request directed at me, HJ or both of us?

[Guest]

At you. I already have a file from HJ.

[Cameron Murdoch]

Katie,

I apologise (lots!) for not getting back sooner. Are your still interested in a file?

Cam

[Guest]

Cameron,

Yes please.

Please include a link to this page, along with the exact printer model (include PS if it's ps) and OS you are using.

Also, include any fonts in the drawing that are not standard system fonts.

tech@nemetschek.net?subject=ATTN:Katie

[jan15]

We've had the same problem as other people have described in this thread, with VW 9 and 10 (but not 8), printing from Windows 2000-Pro to a DesignJet 500-PS. Only occaisional files fail to print, and usually only a certain sheet within each file. Once a file fails to print, no file will print until VectorWorks is shut down and re-started.

When a file doesn't print, I print small areas of the problem sheet, perhaps with certain layers invisible, until I find an area/layer combination that won't print. Then I experiment with that area until I've isolated a "problem" object which won't print even if it's the only thing showing, and I delete and redraw that object. Thereafter, the whole sheet prints with no problem.

The things that I've changed to get the sheet to print have been varied, and make no sense to me, but I'll report those which I can remember in case it helps with the debugging:

--Once it was a nested symbol, and I solved it by exploding the inner symbol (but other nested symbols have had no problem).

--Several times it was a pattern-filled circle inside a symbol, and I solved it by changing to a solid grey fill (but I think other pattern-filled circles have had no problem).

--Twice it was a distorted curved object inside a symbol (either an arc or a polyline, I can't remember, and it looked on-screen as if it had melted and been re-shaped). It only looked distorted at a certain rotation angle. I solved it by rotating the problem iteration to a different angle, after which it looked right on-screen and printed with no problem. (I once had a similar problem in version 8, in which the file printed, but with the "problem" curve looking melted and reshaped only on printout.)

--Once it was a small piece of solid white-filled polyline. It didn't look distorted, but didn't seem to respond to some tool actions. I finally was able to select it and delete it, and then I re-drew it exactly the same.

--Once I divided a large and complicated solid grey-filled polyline into 2 pieces (with hidden edges where they meet). This was actually a different case: the file printed, but on the print-out the fill was distorted, going outside the edges, until I made that change. (Larger and more complicated solid-filled polylines have printed with no problem.)

[Guest]

Jan,

Can you please send a link to this page, along with the file or files you are having this problem with to me?

I am trying to get as many files as possible where problems are cropping up so we and HP can work to resolve the problem as quickly as possible.

tech@nemetschek.net?subject=ATTN:Katie

[DEREK]

We are running VW8 on PC & mac with one PC not liking the 500PS missing info from some drawings. It may be a factor of size some drawings will print others not, or it may be a factor a layer command blocking the print. the PC is on XP Pro by direct TC/IP to the printer via HP Jet direct card. The driver we are working on is downloaded from HP as the driver for XP.