Printer Drivers and Support Information

Printer drivers are programs developed to translate the language of an application to a language the printer can understand. You must have a driver installed to print. Printer drivers also allow users to manipulate the settings, which control printer output. Typically these settings vary from product to product but generally they include options for such things as paper handling, tray selection, and default font.

Printer drivers are complex pieces of software that are the source of many problems, because they are usually written in a hurry and are inadequately tested. Here are a few common printer driver problems:

• The last character on a line is missing.
• Grid lines are missing when you print a format.
• The program crashes when printing, and Windows reports the error as occurring in a file like HPPCL5M.DRV.
• Nonsensical characters appear.

There are three solutions to printer driver problems:

• Get an updated printer driver
• Use a different printer driver
• Change your format

1. Get an updated printer driver
The best solution to a printer driver bug is to get a newer and better printer driver.

2. Use a different driver

If you can't get an updated driver, then you can often relieve your problem by installing a different printer driver. This will not change the way that your existing programs work. This is accomplished by following the following three steps:

• Think of a compatible printer
• Install the driver for that printer
• Print to that printer

3. Change your format This is the last resort. In general, printer drivers behave better on simpler tasks. If you have designed a format on the screen, it may well have background shading that you don't really need, and removing it may make life simpler for the printer driver. There is no guarantee, but it can be worth trying.

Apple Printers

• Apple Corporate Home Page
• Apple Printer Drivers and Support

Apollo Printers

• Apollo Corporate Home Page
• Apollo Printer Drivers and Support

Brother Printers

• Brother Corporate Home Page
• Brother Printer Drivers and Support

Canon Printers

• Canon Corporate Home Page
• Canon Printer Drivers and Support

Compaq Printers

• Compaq Corporate Home Page
• Compaq Printer Drivers and Support

Epson Printers

• Epson Corporate Home Page
• Epson Printer Drivers and Support

Fujitsu Printers

• Fujitsu Corporate Home Page
• Fujitsu Printer Drivers and Support

Hewlett-Packard Printers

• HP Corporate Home Page
• HP Printer Drivers and Support

IBM Printers

• IBM Corporate Home Page
• IBM Printer Drivers and Support

Lexmark Printers

• Lexmark Corporate Home Page
• Lexmark Printer Drivers and Support

Minolta Printers

• Minolta Corporate Home Page
• Minolta Printer Drivers and Support

NEC Printers

• NEC Corporate Home Page
• NEC Printer Drivers and Support

Okidata Printers

• Okidata Corporate Home Page
• Okidata Printer Drivers and Support

Panasonic Printers

• Panasonic Corporate Home Page
• Panasonic Printer Drivers and Support

Pitney Bowes Printers

• Pitney Bowes Corporate Home Page
• Pitney Bowes Printer Drivers and Support

Ricoh Printers

• Ricoh Corporate Home Page
• Ricoh Printer Drivers and Support

Samsung Printers

• Samsung Corporate Home Page
• Samsung Printer Drivers and Support

Sharp Printers

• Sharp Corporate Home Page
• Sharp Printer Drivers and Support

Smith Corona Printers

• Smith Corona Corporate Home Page
• Smith Corona Printer Drivers and Support

Texas Instruments Printers

• Texas Instruments Corporate Home Page
• Texas Instruments Printer Drivers and Support

Xerox Printers

• Xerox Corporate Home Page
• Xerox Printer Drivers and Support