Printing to Laser Printer

[andym]

Hi out there,
I was wondering if anybody could help, I have a customer with an Epox3VSA mobo running Win98SE, the printer port LPT1 is not working, I cannot print to any printer at all, message is "Error writing to LPT1....There was a problem sending your document to the printer....Make sure printer cable connected...."
I installed a PCI printer card, I can now successfully print to a Canon bubblejet printer, but not to the Laser (LBP800), message is "There was a error writing to LPT2 for the printer Canon LBP800. There was a problem printing to the port. Check to make sure your printer is configured to use a valid port. With the bubblet connected...no problems.
I can successfully print to the Laser from another PC however, so there appears nothing wrong with the printer or cables.
I have re-formatted and reinstalled with the same results.
The Printer card is a NetMos with the latest drivers installed.
Bit of a strange one...does anybody have any ideas ??
Thanx

[NooNoo]

First of all, remove or uninstall (depending on the os) your onboard lpt1 port from device manager, reboot and go into the bios and disable the onboard lpt1 (parallel port)

That way the pci card should then become lpt1.

The pci card should be able to be configured in several modes, epp, ecp, spp, ecp+epp and "normal". Some printers object to some modes, so check the manual for the printer that is not working and set the pci card to the correct mode for the printer.

[confus-ed]

Canon lbp 800 supports ecp

Bubblejet supports ecp

But generally it defaults to ecp+epp anyways ?!?... mmmm...

[andym]

Thanks for the reply NooNoo,
I have disabled the onboard LPT and now have LPT1 as the PCI card printer port. I unfortunately get the same error messages. I have tried configuring this card as ECP and EPP but to no avail. I have also tried putting the printer card into another PC and have the same problem, so it seems to me its the way the laser printer interfaces with the card ??
I have 2 printer cards by different makes and both give the same result.
The only way out of it now seems to be either to change out the mobo or try a USB to Parallel adapter.
Thankes for the info as well confus-ed, when I print to this laser from a normal onboard LPT it seems it can be in any mode (I tried them all to see if there was any difference and it seemed to work in all modes).

[NooNoo]

Certainly looks that way - two pci cards, same problem...unless you missed something in the configuration, then yes I would agree, you canon doesnt like the pci card. Just a thought is it the correct parallel cable?

[andym]

Hi Noo,
Tried a new Bi-directional cable out of the box about 20 minutes ago...no change, it funny a bubbljet has no problem whatsoever with the card but the Laser does. I just tried a driver for the LBP810 in case the 800 was corrupted..no luck.

[Platypus]

This is a long shot but maybe worth eliminating anyway. Try booting the system with the laser connected to the computer, but not plugged into the mains. Once Windows is booted up, plug in the printer & turn it on.

There is a weird problem that I haven't seen in a few years, whereby the capacitive load to earth of some printers stops the chip running the parallel port initialising properly. The above procedure usually shows it up. I've known of a couple of instances where with a certain printer, the user has had to boot up either with the printer mains lead unplugged, or plugged in but switched off at the wall.

[confus-ed]

Since we seem to be at the 'stabs in the dark stage' ...

Anything on the printer property pages which might be confusing it ? Mine for instance has a tab 'ports', given that we've been messing with just what lpt1 is, its worth a look to see if the printer is confus-ed too !

Can you print a test page from windows on the laser via its property sheets, and isn't there a 'test communication' button somewheres ? Almost all printer drivers have that option....

& we have of course uninstalled & re-installed the printer driver ? Of course we have ... but just checking !

This is all very strange ... the printer is good, the cables are good, & even the flipping controller card is good ! SO ...? .... as ever !

[PeLiGrOsO]

remove printer from pc
remove your PCI parallel card
boot to BIOS and enable your parallel port
boot to safemode and remove the comports from device manager
boot computer to windows and let it re-detect the ports
debug lpt1 by following
this steps..
lets see what you get.

[andym]

Thanks for all your replys,
I did the following tests Peligroso and came up with the following : The onboard LPT1 tested OK with the port test. With the printer test with no printer connected to the port it returned 70, with the bubblejet connected it returned D0, and with the laser 50. From what I can conclude there it looks like it sees the bubbljet, but is not recieving a status from the printer, but is not seeing the laser at all due to the no D in the report. I suspect this port is not working anyway as I cant print to the bubblejet thru this port either.
I'm not sure of the commands to test the port/printers thru the PCI Printer card. Its as if the laser demands to be printed from an onboard LPT and refuses to interact thru a card. I don't have another laser to test with the card at the moment either. I may have to abandon this little project and maybe try a USB to parallel adapter. ??