On Windows plateforms, the printer spooler is located in one of the folders
associated witht he OS and is separate and distinct from the printer driver
files or the Epson monitoring software, although it works in conjunction
with them. The spooler receives an image file exported from Elements and
maintains that copy spooling it to the printer driver line by line - a few
MBs at a time. The printer itself has a buffer which is relatively small
which receives the data sent it by the printer spooler and holds it until it
can be processed and printed. If the printer's buffer experiences an
overrun for any reason you will get a communicatins error and the printer
will stop printing.
While this may be irrelevant, the folder that contains the printer spooler
within the OS program files is the one requiring sufficient unfragmented
space to handle the image file being received; thus the partition containing
that folder is the one you need to make sure has empty space and
unfragmented space. Art has added a new factor when he notes that the
spooler folder may contain orphaned old temporary spooler files of images
that were sent to the printer; they are only using up storage space and
should be deleated. Do not make the mistake of associating free space on
the hard drive with either unfragmented space or with free space on the
referent partition (unless you only have one partition). If your computer
says you only have a C drive then you only have one partition; but if you
have other drive letters assigned - expect to a floppy drive or removable
drives - you have several partitions on your hard drive.
filmscanners_owner@halftone.co.uk wrote:
> on 7/10/04 11:16 PM, Laurie Solomon at laurie@advancenet.net wrote:
>
>> I am not familiar with how things work on Macs; but you might want
>> to check the hard drive partition on which you have your operating
>> system and printer spooler to make sure that it is unfragmented and
>> that there is enough empty unused unfragmented space on that
>> partition. You might want to run a defragmenting program on that
>> partition. I would also suggest that 320 MB of hardware RAM is not
>> really a whole lot of actual Physical RAM on the the Motherboard for
>> graphics; you might want to turn the virutal memory back on. I would
>> assume that with the OS using some of the RAM, and Elements using
>> some of that RAM, and other possible programs trunning in background
>> using some of that RAM, you may not have enough actual physical RAM
>> left over to spool the file to the printer driver and then to the
>> printer. Remember that the printer spooler will be using a copy of
>> the file which will be in addition to the temporary copy of the file
>> being used by Elements and the original archived file stored on the
>> hard drive. If Elements works at all like Photoshop, the temporary
>> version it uses will be stored in the scratch disk; but it may have
>> to use actual hardware RAM if you have a small scratch disk or one
>> that has run out of enough available unfragmented storage space on
>> the hard drive.
>>
>> Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
>> Checked by AVG anti-virus system ().
>> Version: 6.0.711 / Virus Database: 467 - Release Date: 6/25/04
>>
> Okay, I turned on 990MB of virtual memory, giving me a huge unused
> block of effective RAM, but to no avail.
>
> As far as the hard drive having adequate unfragmented space on it, I
> don't think that would be an issue because there is 18 GB of unused
> space on the HD, and my Mac just "reindexed" the HD yesterday, which
> I believe is Mac-speak for defragmentation. Mac users, please let me
> know if this is incorrect.
>
> As for the Epson memory allocation, the extension file, called SP2200,
> offers no memory control. But the application program for the SP2200
> is called Epson Monitor 3 and it has a recommended memory allocation
> of only about 2 MB. That is so small that it seems to have nothing
> to do with the image size, but I doubled the allocation anyway, and I
> will try that next. If that doesn't work, I'll try increasing it more
> substantially.
>
> ~Berry
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system ().
Version: 6.0.718 / Virus Database: 474 - Release Date: 7/9/04
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unsubscribe by mail to listserver@halftone.co.uk, with 'unsubscribe
filmscanners'
or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or
body
