A+ Unit Six: Printers

Student Name		Member of Team		Team Lead		AM/PM
A+ Test	Essentials 701		1.11 Install and configure printers Differentiate among printer types Laser Inkjet Thermal Impact 1.11 Install and configure printers Local vs. network printers Consumables 2.3 Given a scenario, determine the troubleshooting methods and tools for printers Printer properties and settings Print a test page
A+ Certification Objectives Covered
Turn in for this unit					Time Allotted	8 Days
Labs					Team Lead Check Off	Teacher Check Off
Unit Project (one per group)
ü Customer Overview
ü List of current needs
ü List of future needs
ü List of questions asked of customer
ü Written (at least 2 full page, double spaced) proposal that describes, in clear English, your solution.
ü Diagram of computer components
ü Worksheet from lab
ü Printout of spreadsheet showing complete cost of ALL computers and hardware and software

Printers

Support and Troubleshooting

Sno Isle Skills Center

Tory Klementsen, MCP A+

Printers

l Printers can be your biggest ___________________________ in the work environment because when the printer goes down…___________________________ stops and people freak out.

l Knowing how different ___________________________ work will help you be a more effective technician*

Types of Printers

l Dot ___________________________ /Impact

l Dye ___________________________

l ___________________________

l ___________________________ Jet

l ___________________________ *

Dot-matrix impact printers

¡ Heads contain 9 or 24 ___________________________ and “hit” a ribbon with pins that are pushed forward to make the shape of letters, numbers, and ___________________________ . VERY noisy!

¡ ___________________________ printers have a “daisy” array of letters attached to the ends of metal bars that turn and hit the ribbon.

¡ Dot ___________________________ is still used due to its ability to print onto ___________________________ -part forms

¡ A ___________________________ feed “pulls” the paper through using ___________________________ strips on either side of the page with holes in it.

¡ Can also use ___________________________ feed, but this causes a MYRIAD or paper jams.

¡ Has very low ___________________________ rating*

Inkjet Printers

l Aka “ink ___________________________ ” and “___________________________ ”

l Ink is forced through tiny ___________________________ onto the paper

l Each nozzle is 50-60 ___________________________ in diameter

l Two methods

¡ ___________________________ bubble

lHeats the ink, which ___________________________ , creating a bubble that ___________________________ out onto the page.

¡ Piezoelectric bubble

lCreates a ___________________________ with a ___________________________ crystal behind each nozzle. An electric current vibrates, causing it to either release ink or draw ink into the nozzle (inward ___________________________ releases, outward draws ink in)*

Inkjet Cartridges

l ___________________________ that hold ink

¡ One can hold ___________________________ colors

¡ Four different cartridges

l Colors are cyan, yellow, magenta, and black

l Colors mix together to create millions of colors

l Shades are created through dithering by varying the pattern of dots

l The printhead is usually part of the ink cartridge, which is why recycled cartridges don’t work as well as new.*

Inkjet Printers

Inkjet Quality

l There are usually 300-600 nozzles on an inkjet print head, allowing 300 to 600 dpi

l Piezoelectric printers can print 720x720

l Features

¡ Higher quality

¡ Some can print on CDs

¡ Some can use photo-ink to create realistic photos on photo paper

l Paper sits in a tray and is drawn in through rollers

l http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/indexmag.html?http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/artjan99/inkjet.html

Inkjet Issues

l Photos look good, but are not waterproof and won’t last as long

l Pages printed can smear

l Recycled cartridges can have lower print quality*

Laser Printers

l Images are produced using the ___________________________ process which combines

¡ ___________________________ charges

¡ ___________________________

¡ ___________________________ light

l To produce high quality, ___________________________ images*

Laser Printer Components

l ___________________________ cartridge

l Laser ___________________________ assembly

l ___________________________ supplies

l Paper ___________________________ and transport assembly

l Transfer ___________________________ assembly

l ___________________________ assembly

l Electronic ___________________________ package

l Installed and upgradeable ___________________________ *

Toner Cartridges

l ___________________________ filled with toner—a fine powder made of ___________________________ , ___________________________ , and ___________________________ particles

l EP drum covered with a ___________________________ coating that holds a static ___________________________ until exposed to light

l A ___________________________ that removes used toner from the drum

l A ___________________________ charging assembly which applies a charge to the ___________________________ after the image has printed.*

Laser Scanning Assembly

l Laser—___________________________ on the drum to create an electrostatic image of what’s being printed using areas of negative and positive charge

l Mirror—reflects the ___________________________ beam

l Lenses—___________________________ the laser beam. Multiple lenses can be used.*

Laser Printing Process
You DO have to remember the voltages

l Cleaning - The ___________________________ Blade removes any excess toner which drops into the debris cavity. The ___________________________ lamp that removes any excess charge off the photosensitive drum. This leaves the drum with a charge ___________________________ Volts

l Conditioning - The ___________________________ corona (High Voltage Wire) adds a negative charge of around -___________________________ volts to - ___________________________ volts

l Writing - The ___________________________ light hits the ___________________________ drum, where the light hits the drum it dissipates the negative charge to the center of the drum which is grounded. This then leaves sections of the drum with a voltage of -___________________________ volts

l Developing - The drum rolls through a supply of ___________________________ charged toner particles (Particles are -___________________________ Volts to -___________________________ Volts)

l Where the drum hasn't been touched by the laser light a lower ___________________________ charge is still there, so the particles are not attracted to this section of the photosensitive drum.

l Transfer - A ___________________________ positive charge is applied to the paper, the particles of toner are attracted to the paper.

l Fusing - The toner that is on the paper is heated and ___________________________ , the toner becomes bonded to the paper.

To remember the process

l Clean-Charge-Write-Develop-Transfer-Fuse

l California-Cows-Won't-Dance-The-Fandango

l Can Chris Write Down The Facts?

l I can guarantee this is on the test.

Other Printers

l ___________________________ Ink—use a stick of wax that is melted to create ink, then sprayed onto a drum. Paper passes over the drum and under a roller to transfer the image. VERY high quality, non-___________________________ , and environmentally friendly

l Dye ___________________________ —dye is solid contained on a ribbon or roll. Print head is pushed against the paper using springs. Color depth is controlled by the amount of ___________________________ applied. They require special paper. After the dye is applied, a layer is applied to protect the image from water, UV, and ___________________________ .

Other Printers

l Thermal Printers—Output is produced with heat using either

¡ Thermal wax ___________________________ —Use ink with a wax base. A heating element in the ___________________________ melts the ink from the ribbon. Creates a permanent image

¡ Direct ___________________________ transfer—Use coated paper and a row of heating elements burns dots directly on the paper. ___________________________ .

¡ Thermal ___________________________ —Uses special paper with colored pigments embedded. Each page passes 3 times under the printhead at different temperatures that bring out the colors. UV ___________________________ sets the colors.

Other Printers

l ___________________________ —pen based devices that create line images. Mostly used for engineering.

The Windows Print Process

l Client

¡ User ___________________________ print job

¡ Program calls the ___________________________ (Graphics Device Interface)

¡ Spooler receives the job from the ___________________________

The Windows Print Process

l Spooler

¡ ___________________________ .drv issues an RPC (remote procedure call) to Spoolsv.exe (spool server)

¡ ___________________________ .exe calls the ___________________________ .dll (print router)

¡ ___________________________ .dll routes the print job to either the local printer or the print server

¡ Job goes either directly to the to the ___________________________ monitor or to a language monitor THEN to the port monitor.

lLanguage monitor translates the job into code the printer can understand

The Windows Print Process

l Printer

¡ ___________________________ sends the job to the Printer (not the hardware device, but the share or driver)

¡ Print ___________________________ is translated.

¡ Print device ___________________________ .

¡ On a laser printer, the job is stored in the ___________________________ . Other printers, the RAM on the server or ___________________________ machine is used.*

Installing

l Locally

¡ ___________________________ device

¡ Install ___________________________ or included driver and utilities

l Network

¡ Locate a printer ___________________________ on the network or locate the printer itself and create a share (see labs)

Printer Configuration

l Print ___________________________ —the physical printer

l Print driver—___________________________ the data from the program into printer language. Also manages graphics

l Printer—___________________________ software inside the server that can be configured and shared

l Print queue—___________________________ of hard drive where jobs are stored in order

l Printer port—___________________________ by which printer connects to computer

Printer Languages

l ___________________________ Codes—Used in dot matrix

l ___________________________ Control Language (PCL)—A language used to control a printer created by HP

l ___________________________ —Created by Adobe that is great for scaling fonts and images.

Lab 6-1 Choosing an Appropriate Printer and Installing It

A. Log into Labsim

B. Go into section 7, Printers.

a. Choose 7.2 Printer Configuration

b. Listen to the lecture 7.2.1, 7.2.2, 7.2.3

C. Do lab 7.2.4 and show me that you’ve completed it successfully when you are done.

D. Take the exam until you pass it. Show me.

Lab 6-2 Installing a Printer Share on a Network

1. Get a printer from me and set it up on your DELL computer.
2. You may need to search for a cable to connect it. Be sure to return that cable to its proper place when you are finished.
3. Go online on a Dell and find the drivers for all three of the operating systems you are using.
4. Install the printer. Now share it.
1. Right click on the printer.
2. Select “Sharing”
3. Name the printer share something simple
4. Write down the name of your computer

5. Write down the name of the share

5. Prove that the printer can be accessed from another computer.
1. Open the run command
2. Type \\nameofcomputer\nameofshare

i. Name of computer=your computer name (you wrote it down in d)

ii. Name of share=the share name you gave your printer

6. Install additional printer drivers so others from other operating systems can use your printer.
1. First get the drivers you downloaded in 6-1 and put them on a disk or on your computer.
2. Right click on your printer share and select properties
3. Click the sharing tab.
4. Select Additional Drivers
5. Click Intel Windows 95, 98, and Me. Click ok
6. Browse to the drivers.
7. Now when users of Windows 98 access your printer, they won’t need drivers. Try it with a neighbor who does NOT have the drivers installed.

Have me check off:

____ Printer installed

____Share name

____Additional drivers installed

____Neighbor prints to printer

Lab 6-3 Installing a Network Printer to Share

7. Do this on your Windows XP. You are going to install a printer connected directly to the network onto your computer and set it up as a printer share.
8. Create a new printer. Even though it’s across the room, you’re going to select “Local printer attached to this computer” but you are going to deselect “Automatically detect plug and play”.
9. Click next.
10. Click “Create a new port.”
11. Select “Standard TCP/IP Port”
12. Click Next. Click Next. You’re going to a new wizard.
13. Where it says Printer Name or IP Address type 192.168.1.171. Click next.
14. A window will come up telling you that you have created a port. If it does NOT come up right away, make sure you typed in the right IP address. It goes out and finds the printer and it should find it immediately.
15. Click finish. This takes you back to your installation thingy.
16. It is a Brother HL-5250DN Series. (The drivers will actually already be on your computer because you’ve been printing to this printer already. If they weren’t you’d provide a disk.)
17. Tell it to keep existing driver.
18. Give it a name like “Happy Printer”.
19. Set it as the default printer.
20. Share the printer. Give it your name.
21. Identify your location (computer 13 by Winnie poster)
22. Print a test page. Finish.
23. Look in your printers. There it is!
24. Go online and find if you can get the drivers for Windows 98 and install those drivers like you did in 6-3.

Have me check off:

____ Printer installed

____Share name

____Additional drivers installed

____Neighbor prints to printer

Lab 6-4 Troubleshooting Scenarios

Read “How to Troubleshoot Printer Problems” and answer the questions below with solutions from the text.

Problem	Solution
Darth calls you and tells you his printer was working, the cat walked on it and now it’s not printing any more. It is plugged in and turned on. You ask him to describe the front panel and he says that there are no lights. What should he do?
Stormtrooper Potatohead just installed a new print cartridge in his old inkjet printer that he inherited from this aunt. Now nothing shows up at all on the page. It’s one of those “all in one” catridges and he’s never installed one before. You tell him to make sure it’s seated correctly. It is. What gives?
Dilbert installed a new USB printer. The printer did not come with a USB cable, but rather than buy a new cable he decided to use the old one that he had from an old scanner. Everything appears to work correctly on the printer, except the computer can’t see it.
Fishy’s printer was working fine, but now there is a red light on the panel and he doesn’t know what that means. What would you advise him to do?
Goofy has a printer that had a paper jam. He tried to clear the jam but ended up ripping the paper in the process. Now the printer just blinks a red light and won’t print. He’s tried turning it off and on a number of times and it still won’t print. He can see it on the computer, can see all the print jobs he sent it, but nothing is coming out. It just flashes. What should he check?
Mickey has a really old dot-matrix printer. Suddenly the printer is still acting like it’s printing, but nothing is showing up on the page. If he prints on multi-page forms, the pages underneath the first page print fine through with carbon, and the text is what it should be. Nothing is on the first page, although he can see the imprint of the letters. What should he look for first?

HOW TO TROUBLESHOOT PRINTER PROBLEMS

Introduction. This article will describe some general troubleshooting steps applicable to most, but not all printers.  It is not possible to describe all of the steps one might take to fix every make, model, and type of printer, but in many cases these simple set of procedures and a logical approach may save you a trip to a repair shop or even save that old printer you have just about given up on--don't shoot it yet or give it the old bounce test by dropping it out of a four story window!  A lot of this is pretty much common sense; but, some otherwise obvious steps can be overlooked if you are in a hurry, can be performed in an inefficient sequence without a logical versus an Easter-egging approach, or you have not had the pleasure of troubleshooting a printer before.

PRINTER

1.  Read the book.  I cannot begin to tell you how many people have brought their printer to my shop with the User Manual and paid my wife (no computer expert) $32.50 to sit-down, read the book, and fix the printer.  Unfortunately, some printer books aren't worth reading...

2.  Check the manufacturer's web site.  The problem you are having has most likely happened before.  If the manufacturer has a good web site, you may find the answer there and save a lot of time, money, and frustration.  Go to our Manufacturer Links page to get there fast.

3.  Is it plugged-in?  Make sure the printer is plugged into a live outlet.  If it is plugged into a surge protector, make sure it is on.  Try moving it from the surge protector to a known-good wall outlet.

4.  Is it on?  Ok, you can't print and Windows, etc. says it can't find the printer.  Make sure the darn thing is turned on and there are no error lights (LEDs) lit.  If there are error lights, refer to the user manual/manufacturer's web site.  You should hear the print mechanism initialize when power is applied and most printers have at least one light which will be illuminated when it is on.

5.  Is it on-line?  Most printers have and on-line LED and button or the equivalent.  The computer cannot communicate or send stuff to a printer that is not on-line; i.e., not connected to the cable between the printer and computer, and that is what "on-line" literally means.  Again, I have gone to customer sites, pushed the on-line button, and charged them for my time and travel (I try to accomplish at least that much on the phone, but some...).

6.  Is it beeping at you?  Most printers will beep once or twice during or after initialization.  If it beeps more than that or beeps constantly, the poor thing is either hurt or trying to tell you something is wrong.  Look in the manual or go to the web site to learn what it is saying.  Unfortunately, beep code documentation can be hard to find, the beep you hear may not listed, or the meaning of the beep is nebulous.  Most, printers will beep when out of paper or out of ink and those are the most common causes for a printer turning into a road runner.

7.  Does it test-print?  Most printers have a built-in diagnostics program which can be very useful for troubleshooting problems and test-printing without a computer.  They are usually initiated by pressing a button or two while turning on the printer.  Check your user manual.  If the printer test-prints OK, you have probably eliminated the mechanical print mechanism as the problem.

8.  Does it have ink or toner?  Is the Ink cartridge full, ribbon installed correctly, or laser cartridge full?  An ink jet printer may have a black and a color cartridge.  Check both of them or at least set the printer to use a cartridge with ink in it.  You can usually extend the life of a laser cartridge long enough to order a new one by removing the cartridge and gently shaking it side-to-side to redistribute the tone.  Sometimes you can get a ribbon going temporally by removing from the printer and manually advancing the ribbon past a worn spot by turning the sprockets.

9.  Is it clean?  Most ink jet printers have a simple user procedure for cleaning the print heads.  You may have to clean them periodically or after the printer has been idle for a few days or weeks.  If you see funny colors or print-outs are missing colors, a cartridge may be empty or a head dirty.  You may have to clean a head many times to get it working again.

10.  Does it have paper?  Be sure the paper is installed correctly and there is enough of it.  Most printers have a paper-out detector.  On most dot matrix printers it is a photo diode.  If form-fed paper is not aligned correctly (usually on the left side) the diode won't see it.  DOS may indicate it has lost communications with a printer which is out of paper instead issuing a paper-out error.

11.  Is it jammed?  Paper jams are frequently the reason my wife is able to fix many printers.  She's very good at it (and she has smaller fingers than mine).  Always read the manual on how to clear a jam.    Don't be a "gorilla" with your printer!  You can easily damage a printer (strip gear threads, etc.), or even get hurt, if you do not follow instructions and are not careful.  Turn the power off--unplug it.  You have 110 volts running around the inside many printers.  And print heads, gears, etc. like to nip fingers.

Laser printers have some very fine wires to remove static charges from the paper near the fuser mechanism which will break if you aren't very careful.  Also, the fuser itself can be very hot (it fuses/melts toner to the paper).

Don't move a print head unless the instructions direct it.  You can damage the belt, etc.

Address labels cause many paper jams and cannot always be seen.  The old shirt cardboard trick can be used to dislodge them from many printers.  Just feed a shirt cardboard (or cut a piece of like-sized cardboard form a file folder) through like a sheet of paper and wiggle the label loose and out.

Staples, paperclips, dog hair, and cookie crumbs are among the many things we have coaxed out of printers.  A staple will raise havoc with the drum in laser printers.  If you see vertical lines on pages printed by a laser printer (or copy machine), the drum is probably scratched.  Replacing it can be a very expensive repair, indeed.

If jams persist, or the printer won't feed paper, there is a good chance that gears are stripped or rollers are worn-down or have flat spots.   Fixing this sort of problem may require specialized tools and elaborate alignment procedures and is often best done at a printer repair depot.   It is not usually economically feasible to send low-end ink jet and dot matrix printers, etc. to a repair depot.  Sometimes roller problems can be fixed by cleaning the rollers.

Changing to a different kind of paper may help.  Refer to your user manual for guidance.

On humid days, slightly damp paper can cause jams by sticking together causing more than one sheet to be fed at a time.  Try removing the paper from its tray, etc. and fanning it.  Make sure the edges or corners aren't curled and the tray is either not too empty or too full.  Read the book...

Then there are those printers which no one can figure-out how to dissemble without damaging them...

12.  Is it wedged?  The printer memory could be full or there may my a glitch caused by a power spike.  Turn-off the printer, wait a few seconds and turn it back on.

CABLE

13.  Is it connected? The printer test prints, but it won't go on line...  Well, is the cable from the printer to the computer connected.  Screw down the DB-25 connector at the computer end and clip the Centronics connector at the printer end (your printer and computer may have different connectors; e.g., USB).   Push-in and wiggle the connectors.

14.  Is it connected to the printer port?  Some SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) are physically identical to the male DB-25 connectors used for standard IBM/IBM-compatible printer ports.  Plugging a printer into a SCSI port can damage the SCSI host board and the printer.

15.  Do you have the correct cable?  Many printers now require an IEEE 1284 and Bi-Directional.  USB cables shouldn't be longer than 15 feet.

16.  Is the cable good?  Check for bent pins.  Try another cable.

17.  Is it connected properly?  Screw the PC end down and latch the Centronics end at the printer.

18.  Is there something else connected to the printer port?  Disconnect it and uninstall the device drivers for it.

19. Does the printer port have a software security device on it?  These devices attach to the printer port and the printer cable attaches to the device.  They can break.  Try printing without it.

COMPUTER

20.  Is the printer port set-up correctly in your computer's BIOS Setup?  Try the various printer modes in your computer's CMOS Setup. ECP+EPP usually works with bi-directional printers, but others may fix the problem.

21.  Is the correct printer cable/header assembly installed and is it plugged-in right?  I have seen cases where a baby AT motherboard was upgraded, but the printer cable/header assembly from the old motherboard was used and caused problems, but that is very rare. Also, the cable connecting to the motherboard could be backwards or loose.

DOS

22.  Does it print from the DOS prompt?  Try F8 (F8 or hold the Ctrl Key for Win 98) just as Windows starts to boot, select the DOS prompt from the resulting menu, find a non-zero length text file (one that is 1-2K would be a good choice) (e.g., autoexec.bat or something ending in .txt), and print from DOS with:
C:\>type autoexec.bat>lpt1:
or
C:\>type filename.txt>LPT1:

Click Cancel, turn the printer off, unplug the printer cable, wait a few seconds, reconnect the cable, make sure the printer is on with no error lights, restart Windows, and try again.’  Try the various printer modes in your computer's CMOS Setup. ECP+EPP usually works with bi-directional printers, but others may fix the problem. Try F8 just as Windows starts to boot, select the DOS prompt from the resulting menu, find a non-zero length text file (one that is 1-2K would be a good choice) (e.g., autoexec.bat or something ending in .txt), and print from DOS with:
C:\>type autoexec.bat>lpt1:
or
C:\>type filename.txt>LPT1:
If that works consistently, the problem is probably in Windows.

WINDOWS

23.  Is it set-up properly?  Be sure Windows is set-up correctly with the correct printer driver and something else (another printer, FAX, etc.) is not assigned LPT1: Be sure the printer is set as the default Windows printer. Try it on another desktop computer. If that works, try another printer on the suspect computer.  Uninstalling and reinstalling the printer often fixes problems.   Get rid of duplicate printers.

24.  Does it have a stuck print queue?  Start>Settings>Printers>double click the printer> Printer>Purge Print Documents

25.  Have you used Windows Help to solve the problem? Start>Help>Contents>Troubleshooting>Windows 98 Troubleshooters>Print.

26.  Have you used Microsoft's Knowledge Base?  Start with: Q128345 Troubleshooting Printing Problems in Windows 95/98

.