- CompTIA A+ 220-901 Exam Topics
- Key Topics
- Selecting a Printer
- Installing Printers
- Installing Multifunction Printers for SOHO
- Printer Drivers
- Configuring the Printer
- Local Connections
- Network Printer Installation
- Wireless Printing
- Cloud Printing/Remote Printing
- Apple Printing
- Secure Printing
- Study Resources
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Configuring the Printer
Depending on the printer, configuration options can be found on the device itself, included with the driver, or accessed through a web browser on a networked device. When working with the print driver, right-click the printer and select the Properties option. Selections can include managing print jobs, configuring the print spooler, managing permissions, as well as other options more specific to the device itself.
The first printer installed will become the default printer. This can be changed later when more printers are added. Many applications automatically select the default printer.
Configuration Settings
Typical configuration settings include some or all of the following:
Duplexing—Requires a duplexing unit to be installed; prints on both sides of a paper.
Collate—Putting pages in order and then in sequence (for example, Print Job 1 – 123, Print Job 2 – 123, Print Job 3 – 123).
Orientation—Based on viewing a page vertically (called portrait) versus horizontally (called landscape).
Drawers/Trays—Some units can have additional paper trays installed.
Finishing—One or two sided (duplex) stapling, collating, banner printing, and spooling settings.
Quality—Used to change how much ink is dispersed depending on the importance of the document. It’s measured in dots per inch (DPI); 600 DPI or higher is considered letter quality.
Printer Priority—Can be set from 1 to 99; it is possible to install two software printers that print to the same physical printer. This is one scenario in which priority might be useful; two or more physical printers could be combined to create a printer pool where print priority might be an issue.
Printing Preferences—Includes page setup, finishing, paper source, and quality.
Print Spooling
Print spooling is the process of sending the print job to a file one page at a time until the job is finished. This can help alleviate low memory problems on the printer. It also enables the user to continue working while the print job is run in a background process.
Several options are available when working with the print spoolers. The first option is to start the print job immediately. This setting provides one page at a time to be sent to the spooler. The second option is to start printing after the last page is spooled. The entire document is sent to the hard drive and then sent to the printer. Another option is to print directly to the printer and bypass the print spooler altogether. Be sure to have a lot of memory in the printer before choosing this option.
In Windows, the print spooler is controlled by a service. It is the service’s responsibility to print requests and send them to the printer. If the print server fails, the service can be stopped, started, or restarted using the following methods:
Computer Management—Open the Computer Management window and expand Services and Applications; then select Services and scroll until you find the Print Spooler. Right-click the service and select Start, Stop, or Restart.
Task Manager—Open Task Manager (right-click the taskbar and select it or press Ctrl+Shift+Esc). Then go to the Services tab and scroll until you find the Print Spooler.
At the command prompt—Type in net start spooler or net stop spooler.
Calibration
Monitors or computer displays create color images using pixels that contain three colors: red, green, and blue. Printers use cyan, magenta, yellow, and black (CMYK). Trying to get the two to match requires a process called calibration. Color and ink jet printers usually provide some type of calibration utility used to calibrate the printer to match the monitor. It can also be performed on the device itself. Calibrating actually aligns the cartridge nozzles to the paper and each other. Without it, the print quality degrades over time. Look for fuzzy lines or colored areas that don’t look right.
Testing the Printer
After installing the printer driver, print a test page in Windows to determine whether the installation was successful. The Print Test Page box is usually found on the General tab of the Printer Properties windows. You can find this by going into Devices and Printers in Windows 7 and in 8, by right-clicking the printer, and selecting Printer properties. Some printers offer an option on the print device itself to not only print a test page, but also print the configuration information.
