Printers, Print Quota, & Printing Printers, Print Quota, & Printing
Printers | Color Printers | Print Quota | Checking Print Quota | Printing from Linux |Printing from Windows | Add a Printer | Duplex Printing | Print Job Status | Troubleshooting
The Elder and Hering labs have four HP LaserJet laser printers, two in each lab. 2301 SC lab has one LaserJet printer. Students can print from Windows or Linux applications to those printers. You can print formatted text, PDF, and PostScript files on the lab and departmental laser printers. Pages printed in the Elder, Hering, and 2301 SC labs cost $.05 per page.
To add a printer, see that section below.
CSS has an HP color laser printer, called ptrcss10, that produces outstanding output; the colors are bright and deep, including the black; and is fast. Output is $.25 per side printed. Students should come to the consulting office, 1253 SC, to claim output from the color printer. Faculty and staff can arrange color printing on that printer by contacting the CSS main office, 335-5751, 1256 SC.
Also in 1253 SC there is an HP Photosmart color inkjet printer that can print on paper up to 14" x 17". You must supply your own photo-quality inkjet paper; there is no additional charge to use the printer. This inkjet printer is a local printer and so must be used in 1253SC, where it resides.
Every student Engineering account has a dollar-based print quota for printing. Currently, students are allocated $10.00 of print quote at the beginning of the fall and spring semesters, and $5.00 of print quota for the summer semester. At five cents per page, this amounts to 200 printed pages. If you print duplex on the black and white printers, you are charged only $.05/page; thus with duplex printing you could print as many as 400 pages before using all your print quota. At the beginning of each semester, print quota is reset to the allocated amount.
Once you have used your $10.00, you begin using credit printing. The default print credit amount is $25/month and this amount is enabled by default for each valid computing account. With credit printing as you print pages each month, the charges are accumulated. Until the monthly printing has been added to your U-Bill, your printing quota will show a negative balance. Each month your U-Bill will show a charge for the printing you have done, up to $20 or the amount you authorized. After the month's print charge has been added to your U-Bill, your print account is set back to zero and you begin credit printing up to the default or other monthly limit you have set.
If you do not want printing charged to your U-Bill or you want to authorize a monthly amount less than $25, you must come into the CSS office, 1256 SC.
If you do not have charging privileges, you will have to pay for additional print quota at the Engineering Electronics Shop, 2018 SC. Additional printing that you purchase with cash in this manner will not carry over to the next semester, nor will it be refunded.
To print from Linux applications, select the Print option from the application menu and follow the instructions. If you are working in the Elder, Hering. or 2301 SC labs, the output from your job will be on the printer(s) nearest that lab. In addition, if you are working on an odd-numbered machine, e.g., L-LNX003, your output will be on the odd-numbered printer, PTRCSS01 or 03. Conversely if you are using an even-numbered machine, your output will be on the even-numbered printer, PTRCSS00 or 02.
From a shell, use the lpstat command to view your files in the print queue.
To print a file, select the Print option from the application menu and follow the instructions. Your print quota is adjusted by the number of pages that you print.
Printing is automatically set to print on one side of the paper. You can use duplex printing (prints on the front and back of the page); see the following duplex section for how to select duplex printing.
(Vista) From the Control Panel, select Printer from Hardware and Sound. Click Add a printer, then Add a network, wireless or Bluetooth printer and Next. If the printer you want to add is not in the list, click The printer that I want isn't listed at the bottom of the dialogue box.
(XP) Go to Start | Printers and Faxes. Select File and then Add Printer. Follow the Add Printer wizard by clicking Next two times.
(Vista and XP) Select Find a printer in the directory and click Next.
Leave all fields blank and click Find Now to see a list of available printers. Scroll down the list to find the printer you want to install and double click on it. You can make this printer the default by clicking that option. Finally click Finish.
Note that there are two listings for many printers: ptrxxx##ps and ptrxxx##pcl. The name indicates the printer driver used: "ps" is PostScript and "pcl" is Printer Command Language, used by HP printers. Some document types print more correctly with one driver than the other.
Duplex printing is printing on both sides of the sheet of paper. By printing on both sides of the paper, you get twice the output for each sheet of paper. Duplex printing on the black and white printers prtcss00, 01, 02, and 03 costs $.05/page; to print both sides of a page costs $.05. The HP LaserJet printers in the Elder, Hering, and 2301 SC labs can print duplex pages.
On a Windows computer, select the Print command from the application you are using. Select File | Print, choose one of the HP LaserJet printers, and click the Properties button.
The illustration at the top right shows how the duplexing will be done; in this illustration the page will flip along the left side of the paper. Change that on the option "Print on both sides:". You can also set the paper source, pages per sheet, and orientation from this dialogue box. Make changes to the default settings as appropriate, then click OK to print your document.
In the printer window (Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Printers) double click on the printer you sent the job to see the status of your print job. If the print queue is short, your job may disappear from the printer status window before you can view your print job. The print queue window includes information on the document name, status, number of pages, size, and time submitted to print.
If one of the lab printers is out of service, notify a consultant in 1253 SC or a CSS staff member in 1256 SC. If no student staff is available and the CSS office is closed, please leave the printer alone. The problem will be corrected as soon as a monitor or staff member is available.
If you have sent a file to the printer that has not printed within a reasonable amount of time, please do not re-send the file. Check to see if there was an error message on your screen. Check your print quota by looking at the Papercut window. Use Papercut to look at your print and transaction history.
If you cannot get your file to print and there is no problem with the printer, see the consultant in 1253 SC for assistance, or call the consultant at 319-335-5055.
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