Thomas H. George wrote:
On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 06:11:07PM -0500, microwaverich wrote:
Thomas H. George wrote:
Occasionally something in a .ps document fails to translate (gs?) into a
printable document and my printers then spit out hundreds of pages each
containing one line of jibberish.
It does no good to clear the print queue, to turn the printer on and off
or even to re-boot the system. After all this the printer error light
keeps blinking and, if more paper is inserted, the printer resumes
printing pages each containing one line of jibberish.
I suppose the printer's memory is filled with instructions that cause
this and any command, if it exists, might be specific the make/brand of
the printer. I have encounter the problem with my Brother HL-730 laser
printer and my HP Deskjet 940c.
The only solution I have found is the refeed the pages until the memory
runs out. Then I print the offending document to a file, open it with the
gimp and then print the gimp image.
I hope there is a better way.
Tom
I use an old HP 500C that has the same behavior. As I understand it,
when you press Reset or turn the printer off and on again, the reset
only clears a portion of the printer's memory - up to the next linefeed,
or something like that.
If the document is short enough, pressing Reset repeatedly will clear
the memory, but that can be tiring (and a bit silly).
Also a bit silly, but completely effective with the HP 500C, is to
unplug the printer briefly. That apparently clears the memory, which
doesn't happen when it's just turned off and on.
.... Rich
I had great hopes for this idea but no dice. Removed the power cable
for several minutes but this did not cure the problem. Surprizing as I
purchased the Brother HL-930 laser printer in 1997 for $200 - wow, how
declining tech prices have offset inflation - so I hoped it used older
memory technology which would not survive power off.
When I ran into such trouble some years ago, had to go to the CUPS
printer configuration
http://localhost:631/
and needed to eliminate all pending print jobs.
Hugo Wau
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