Help! Printer/Win2k tech support

General Questions
#1

I can’t get my LaserJet 5P printer to work under Win2k. I know the printer works (self-test), I know that the cable is good (it prints off another computer), and as far as Windows is concerned, everything is wonderful, too. I print a test page, and nothing. No errors, no printing, nothing. The printer control panel shows my printer as the default and “ready”, and Windows acts like it is printing successfully. I’ve reset my parallel port in the BIOS, and Windows Device Manager says all is well. What struck me as strange was that Windows was unable to detect my printer before I installed the driver.

I have no idea where the information is going…

And yes, I have downloaded the newest drivers from HP :).

Please make it work, and thanks in advance.

#2

It may be that you need a bidirectional cable. The current cable may work with the other computer because it isn’t doing a two-way communication with the printer.

If this is it, two possible solutions: a) get a bidirectional cable (about 2-3 x the cost of unidirectional) or b) dig around on HPs site for a way to disable the two-way communication. I’ve had this problem before with different HP printers, and they had some instructions out there somewhere. All I can recall was that it involved tweaking a file called \winnt\hpxxxx.ini. It may have been in \winnt\system. And the xxxx was something else.

I know that’s vague, but hope it helps.

#3

If Bill H. is correct about the problem, disabling bi-directional communications is fairly easy in Win2000. Open the Printers window. Right click on the printer and go into Properties. Click on the Details tab and click on the Spool Settings button. There is an option for enabling/disabling bi-directional support. I honestly don’t know if this will resolve your problem, but that’s one thing to try.

I had a similar problem when I got my new computer a few weeks ago. I finally figured out that I still had my printer cable plugged into my old computer. :slight_smile:

#4

I shut off spooling (my printer contol panel was slightly different than described above but I think I followed the spirit of it) and now I’m “printing directly to the printer.” Now the documents show up in the print queue but still don’t print.

I’ve also noticed that since I’ve been fiddling with the printer, Windows2k takes a long time to shut down (on the Saving Your Settings dialog box).

Thanks for your help. As you can probably tell, I’ve stumped the tech support whizzes at HP and Dell. I really don’t want to buy a new printer unless all hope is lost.

#5

A couple of reasons a printer won’t respond: 1. cable isn’t tight 2. something else is using the parl printer port & the computer is waiting for it to finish the task before it prints.

Did you try printing from DOS prompt? Make a small text file & at the prompt just use: copy text.txt prn

You can also boot with a floppy of another Dos operating system & try that Dos test to see if it’s a software item.

#6

I tried printing from a command prompt with no avail. The cable is tight as tight can be. I’ll hunt around work today for a computer running an earlier OS for a boot disk…

#7

You could search at http://www.google.com/

Drop in something fancy like: ‘printer won’t print under windows 2000’

The first answer I got was like ideal:
"COM+ and Windows 2000: Ten Tips and Tricks for Maximizing …
… particular flight. They won’t tell you … in the print preview of … components in Windows
2000, and … I can’t run some … 11 Dec 2000, More. … laserget 5 Printer. If anyone …
msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/1200/comtips/comtips.asp - 82k "

But it turned out to be a blank page, maybe you can read it though.

#8

I was able to read the suggested page, but it contained nothing of interest. I’ve contacted Win2k techsup, and actually reached a human being who, in theory, knows what he’s doing. He’s given me a data gathering tool and I’ve emailed it back to him. I’ll invest some more time in it tomorrow.

Thanks for all your help, handy. I really depreciate it. :slight_smile: