HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 16:25 #1

Just popping in

hey guys,

i recently bought a hp 2605dn and i've hooked it up via the router and use lpr.device with it.

now, when i do some postscript printing for some reason it refuses to
utilize the whole area (A4) , 3 cm from the bottom to be exact , i've fiddled
with the printer ps prefs but nothing i do make it print in that 3 cm area.

here's my postscript prefs:

Driver mode: Passthrough
Copies: 1
Paper format: DIN A4
Paper Width: 21,00
Paper height: 29,70
Horizontal DPI: 600
Vertical DPI: 600

Text (default):
Font: Courier
Pitch: Normal
Orientation: Portrait
Tab: 1 inch

Dimensions (default):
Left margin: 2,54
Right margin: 2,54
Top margin: 2,54
Botton margin: 2,54
Font pitch pize (yes it says pize): 10,0
Line leading: 2,0
Lines per inch: 6
Lines per page: 58

Graphics:
Left edge: 0,99
Top edge: 2,99 (setting this to zero cuts the page,like it have a negative value)
Width: 20,00
Height: 26,70
Image: Positive
Shading: Grey scale
Dither: Default

Scaling:
Aspect: Normal
Scaling type: None
Centering: None

---

Any clues?

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 17:33 #2

Quite a regular

@frak

Quote:

here's my postscript prefs:

Driver mode: Passthrough
Copies: 1
Paper format: DIN A4
Paper Width: 21,00
Paper height: 29,70
Horizontal DPI: 600
Vertical DPI: 600

----- Snip -----

Graphics:
Left edge: 0,99
Top edge: 2,99 (setting this to zero cuts the page,like it have a negative value)
Width: 20,00
Height: 26,70
Image: Positive
Shading: Grey scale
Dither: Default

--- Snip ---

Any clues?

It looks like your paper size is A4 (21.0x29.7), but your Graphic print size is 3cm shorter, ie 26.7cm.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 18:04 #3

Just popping in

@Swoop

i can't go beyond that value when top margin is set to greater than zero.

i did raise the paper format value 3 cm (breaking the A4 standard) at one point thinking i might get around this behavior, but i just got the same result.

edit:

if only print would show up with top edge set to 0 (or 0,5) , i mean it can't be a coincidence that if i set 2,99 for the top and then lack 3 cm at the bottom...almost like i need to align the printer *groan*.

Edited by frak on 2007/3/3 18:22:39

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 18:32 #4

Quite a regular

@frak

My settings:-
Quote:
Driver mode: Postscript
Copies: 1
Paper format: DIN A4
Paper Width: 21.00 (Ghosted)
Paper height: 29.70 (Ghosted)
Horizontal DPI: 600
Vertical DPI: 600

Text):
Font: Helvetica
Pitch: Normal
Orientation: Portrait
Tab: 1 inch

Dimensions (default):
Left margin: 0.55
Right margin: 0.55
Top margin: 0.55
Botton margin: 0.55
Font pitch pize (yes it says pize): 10.0
Line leading: 2.0
Lines per inch: 6
Lines per page: 67

Graphics:
Left edge: 0.0
Top edge: 0.0
Width: 21.00
Height: 29.70
Image: Positive
Shading: Color
Dither: (Ghosted)

Scaling:
Aspect: Normal
Scaling type: None
Centering: None

Just a little silly, and probably a typing error, but you are showing comma's instead of full stop/points in all your decimal places.

Also, Only use the enter key, or the mouse to leave a text box. If you hit return your A1 will freeze.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 18:41 #5

Just popping in

@Swoop

commas or decimals are displayed according to locale prefs..in my case they are indeed commas.

and yes..that freeze certainly is amusing at first :D

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 19:39 #6

Just popping in

@frak

Are we talking about text printing or graphics printing?
And from which application?

The passthrough mode suggests that you are using an
application which already creates PostScript output
by itself, so maybe you have to set the correct page
size and borders inside that application.

Also your gfx settings (no scaling, no centering) seem
to suggest that it depends on the aspect ratio of the
source image which destination image height results
from it, and when the destination height is smaller than
the paper height the lower region remains white IMHO.

What happens when you print into a file (with
printtofile.device as printer port device set in Printer prefs)
and view that file with AmiGS? Has it the same idea about
borders as your printer? Anything in the output file which
looks wrong? PostScript is somehow readable by humans...

And what does your printer manual say about unprintable
borders?

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 19:54 #7

Just popping in

@frak

Quote:

Font pitch pize (yes it says pize)

Fixed, thanks.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/3 22:45 #8

Just popping in

@TetiSoft

okay i've done the print to file deal and yes, basically the same.

what i'm trying to print is a dvd cover, gfx that is.

height 27,2 cm width 18,4 cm (normal mode)

i've now set Printer PS to output US Letter instead of A4, The output is perfect.

I'm just guessing but i think anything set higher than US Letter won't come thru as ment...could you verify this theory in the code?

thanks for all the pointers.

edit: removed useless babble (still some left i know)

Edited by frak on 2007/3/3 23:07:16

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/4 11:44 #9

Just popping in

@frak

Quote:

i've now set Printer PS to output US Letter instead of A4, The output is perfect.

Then your printer probably thought your paper would be US Letter.
Quote:

I'm just guessing but i think anything set higher than US Letter won't come thru as ment...could you verify this theory in the code?

No, my current working theory is that the PostScript printer
driver doesnt explicitly tell the printer which size its paper
has, it assumes that the printer knows that by itself and tells
it to print the picture scaled to absolute dimensions which
of course fails when the printer is unaware of the physical
size of the page and assumes it would be US Letter only,
then it crops the image.

In theory it should be possible to define the paper size
in the output but in practice even AmiGS seems to ignore
such a definition and always shows "Letter" as paper size
here, hints how to properly define the paper size in the
output in such a way that both AmiGS and a real printer
understand it are welcome.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/4 12:16 #10

Just popping in

@TetiSoft

Quote:

Then your printer probably thought your paper would be US Letter.

tried with AmiGS only so far,it displays everything just like my printer does anyway...including the faulty A4 output.

Quote:

No, my current working theory is that the PostScript printer
driver doesnt explicitly tell the printer which size its paper
has, it assumes that the printer knows that by itself and tells
it to print the picture scaled to absolute dimensions which
of course fails when the printer is unaware of the physical
size of the page and assumes it would be US Letter only,
then it crops the image.

In theory it should be possible to define the paper size
in the output but in practice even AmiGS seems to ignore
such a definition and always shows "Letter" as paper size
here, hints how to properly define the paper size in the
output in such a way that both AmiGS and a real printer
understand it are welcome.

Yes, you are confirming what i thought, sorry i didn't make myself better understood.

I'll dig thru google and see if i can find some files that AmiGS reports as anything besides "Letter".

edit:

ok here's one: http://www.cs.utah.edu/flux/papers/sc ... sigcomm03/posterabs-a4.ps , reported as beeing 210x297 (A4) in AmiGS,printing this to a file converted it to US Letter.

Edited by frak on 2007/3/4 12:53:45

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/4 12:16 #11

Quite a regular

@TetiSoft

Quote:

In theory it should be possible to define the paper size
in the output but in practice even AmiGS seems to ignore
such a definition and always shows "Letter" as paper size
here, hints how to properly define the paper size in the
output in such a way that both AmiGS and a real printer
understand it are welcome.

In AmiGS print setup there is a GS arguments text box, would it be possible to enter the pagesize in there?

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/5 11:17 #12

Just popping in

@frak

To tell GhostScript (and maybe your printer too) that your
paper size is A4, print into a file, search the part which
specifies the paper size (when not in passthrough mode this
can be found by searching for "a4", then add

/setpagedevice where
{ pop 1 dict
dup /PageSize [ 596 842 ] put
setpagedevice
} if

The next version of the PostScript printer driver will
do that automatically.

When your printer understands PostScript level 2, its also
possible to change the line

/a4 {} def

in Devs:postscript_init.ps into

/a4 { << /PageSize [ 596 842 ] >> setpagedevice } def

then it should work without the need to manually edit each
PS file.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/5 11:27 #13

Just popping in

@Swoop

IMHO passing the pagesize from AmiGS to GhostScript is already
done and the problem is that AmiGS has no idea about the pagesize.
To tell it about it, replace the first line of the PS file
("%!PS") with e.g.

%!PS-Adobe-3.0
%%DocumentMedia: a4 596 842 0 () ()
%%EndComments

and add a line

%%Page: 1 1

just before the first "newpath" line, then AmiGS will display
the width and height specified with the DocumentMedia comment
as paper size. The next version of the PostScript printer driver
will do that automatically.

Note, this fixes only the reported paper size of AmiGS,
not the wrong display of GhostScript, you also need to
apply the fix described in the previous comment for this.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/5 13:18 #14

Quite a regular

@frak

Quote:

I'll dig thru google and see if i can find some files that AmiGS reports as anything besides "Letter".

edit:

ok here's one: http://www.cs.utah.edu/flux/papers/sc ... sigcomm03/posterabs-a4.ps , reported as beeing 210x297 (A4) in AmiGS,printing this to a file converted it to US Letter.

I have just downloaded this to ram, selected it and it opened in AmiGS displayed and stated as '210x297 mm(A4)'.
I then printed to PAR: as postscript, and it was printed as A4, the printer did not request that I select another page.
Which usually id the case if a US Letter ps file is loaded into AmiGS.

The only difference in our settings is the margins.Could you try changing the dimensions, before you set the graphic sizes. Possibly saving the prefs after you have set the margins, and re-open to set the graphics preferences.

I have a HP colour Laserjet 2550LN, and I don't think the PDL, or Postscript versions will be any different.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/5 20:07 #15

Just popping in

@TetiSoft

thanks for the solution, i can now utilize the whole paper area.

i do however have problems now with the actual size of graphical outputs beeing smaller than they should be
(when scaling is off, scaling on uses the whole paper),
but i'm sure i'll find a way to adjust this in time.

edit:

okay the best way i've found is to have a canvas the same exact same size of a A4 document then paste images on that..then no resizing will occur.

thanks again.

Edited by frak on 2007/3/5 20:38:06

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/6 3:15 #16

Quite a regular

@frak

Quote:

ok here's one: http://www.cs.utah.edu/flux/papers/sc ... sigcomm03/posterabs-a4.ps , reported as beeing 210x297 (A4) in AmiGS,printing this to a file converted it to US Letter.

OK.

Re-read your post and tried printing to a file, and I can confirm AmiGS does convert it to US letter. Sorry about me mis-understanding.

I will try Detlef's recomendations.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/6 13:41 #17

Quite a regular

@TetiSoft

Quote:

IMHO passing the pagesize from AmiGS to GhostScript is already
done and the problem is that AmiGS has no idea about the pagesize.
To tell it about it, replace the first line of the PS file
("%!PS") with e.g.

%!PS-Adobe-3.0
%%DocumentMedia: a4 596 842 0 () ()
%%EndComments

and add a line

%%Page: 1 1

just before the first "newpath" line, then AmiGS will display
the width and height specified with the DocumentMedia comment
as paper size. The next version of the PostScript printer driver
will do that automatically.

Note, this fixes only the reported paper size of AmiGS,
not the wrong display of GhostScript, you also need to
apply the fix described in the previous comment for this.

I am not sure what you mean by the reported paper size of AmiGS, and the wrong display of Ghostscript.
I have different size PDF files, some 'printed' on a PC, sized US letter (216x279), or A4 (210x297) and also an A3 one which I downloaded. AmiGS states the seems to show the different sizes correctly, but it wont print the A3 one, the A4 is printed correctly, and with the US letter one I have to press the continue button on the printer after every page.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/6 14:50 #18

Just popping in

@Swoop

Quote:

I am not sure what you mean by the reported paper size of AmiGS, and the wrong display of Ghostscript.
I have different size PDF files

I was talking about the output of the OS4 PostScript printer
driver, it didnt contain explicit paper size specifications
in the PostScript output.

PDF files are something different, when you have problems
with the paper size of those if may be a problem in
GhostScript or in AmiPDF.

Re: HP LaserJet 2605dn,Postscript Height Issue

Posted on: 2007/3/7 2:52 #19

Quite a regular

@TetiSoft

Quote:

When your printer understands PostScript level 2, its also
possible to change the line

/a4 {} def

in Devs:postscript_init.ps into

/a4 { << /PageSize [ 596 842 ] >> setpagedevice } def

then it should work without the need to manually edit each
PS file.

I have applied the above patch, and when I print the 'posterabs-a4.ps' to ram:test.ps, AmiGS shows the page size as 216x279, even though AmiGS showed the original file page size as 210x297.

Any indications what I am doing wrong?