Jump to content
  • 0

HP Design Jet 430


smithandcostudio

Question

I'm sure it's been covered here before, but haven't found it anywhere. We're running the latest VectorWorks, with the latest OSX updates on imacs , through a PC (parallel port) to a DesignJet 430....Printing quality of our Vectorworks drawings since switching over to MAC are horrendous, through the same plotter. We used to run an older version of VectorWorks, on PC's, and lineweights and quality was fine.

It's marginally better if we change the Document preferences to "black & white only" before sending it to plot, but this seems like an extra step that shouldn't be necessary, Being a little more unfamiliar with macs and the printing preferences, maybe there is something completely simple I am overlooking...

Help??/

Thanks!

Link to comment

12 answers to this question

Recommended Posts

  • 0

Our OSX office prints to two HP430s and we get good lineweights. We have other problems (very slow, lots of patterns don't print). Rasterize does solve some of these problems, but compounds others (speed takes another big hit).

We always switch to B&W only before printing.

Link to comment
  • 0

similar to Drake, the "rasterize" option fixed some, but was really really slow.

Before upgrading we were on an older version 8, and had no problems with the same plotter whatsoever.

I guess by "horrendous" I mean in contrast to the old plots from V8. They were sharp, clean and all patterns etc plotted as well.

Now we also switch to Black and White only for plots, and it helps lineweights somewhat (never had to print with that option on before though), but lines are muddled sometimes to the point of looking like they were drawn with a dull pencil rather than an ink pen.

Link to comment
  • 0

quote:

Originally posted by smithandcostudio:

... but lines are muddled sometimes to the point of looking like they were drawn with a dull pencil rather than an ink pen.

If you mean to say that the blacks are grey instead of black, there is a solution. You can adjust the densities of the colors, including black.

My 455 was printing a little grey. The lines did not have the "snap" that I expected. I simply made the black denser and all is well.

Link to comment
  • 0

Hi

If you check the support page for the design jet printers at hp you will see that there is big fat Zero support for the older HP plotters. We have a 488ca and have the same problem. Gimp print under os x at least allows us to keep using the printer, but it is worth noting that it was developed by unpaid enthusiasts and not HP or apple. So we have to put up with it in the mean time, as apple considers things like desktop widgets a higher priority than making stuff work for their professional users. Which is a bit rude considering that we were the ones who stuck with them through the beige computer years. RANT RANT RANT.

Link to comment
  • 0

my 455 works just fine with osx 10.3 & 10.2 thanks to gimp print... and in 10.3 apple was nice enough to supply gimp drivers right in the os ! Just went to the printcenter and there it was ! couldn't be more simple. thanks apple for plug & play with a unsupported old wide format hp plotter which Hp doesn't even support anymore. I think apple should be congratulated on doing something that hp or microsoft for taht matter would never do. rant, rant, rant

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Answer this question...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...