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Troubleshooting Peripheral I/O Ports ]
I am experiencing garbled output or other problems printing
Explanation: The printer is functioning but is producing strange output, garbled
characters, vertical lines or other anomalies.
Diagnosis: There are a few common causes of this sort of problem. One is a bad
printer driver. Another is a resource conflict on the parallel port. A poor-quality or
damaged printer cable can cause this sort of behavior as well.
Recommendation:
- Check the printer driver that is selected within the application or operating system.
Make sure it is the correct one for the printer. Consider replacing it with an upgraded
driver obtained from the manufacturer's web site.
- There may be a resource conflict with the parallel port. See the section discussing problems with the parallel port for some ideas.
- Your printer cable may be bad. Check particularly for loose connectors or frayed wire
near where the connectors attach to the cable. Also, some newer printers require the use
of higher-grade cables; the old $5 job may have worked on your dot matrix but may not
support the newer printers, especially those that use bidirectional communication from the
printer to the PC.
- Some printers may require the use of IEEE-1284-certified printer cables. Consult your
documentation.
- Try changing the parallel
port mode. ECP mode may cause problems with some printers. You may also need to make
sure that EPP mode is enabled for some printers that use bidirectional communication with
their printer drivers.
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