When you add a printer, the wizard adds an icon for
it in the Devices and Printers window, and it’s ready to go. At that
point, you can start using it, or you can adjust its preferences and
properties to suit your taste.
Each printer driver
several sets of preference and roperties dialogs, each with enough
settings to choke a horse.
Different
printers have different features, and your printer’s driver will dictate
the particular set of options that will be available. Because of the
variations possible, the following sections describe only the most
general and common options. (In other words, your fancy new printer may
have options we’ve never even heard of.)
Note Each
printer has also a Properties dialog box, but on Windows 7, it’s of no
use because of how the new Devices and Printers window is organized.
(The Properties dialog is
useful for most other devices.) It takes a little getting used to,
because in all previous versions of Windows, to configure a printer you
would right-click its icon and select Properties. In Windows 7, you must
use the other three choices that I just mentioned. |
As I mentioned, there are several sets of printer properties and preferences, each of which serves a different purpose:
Printing Preferences—
These are the default settings that each application will start with
when you use the application’s Print function. These include paper size,
page orientation, and paper source. Although many applications have a
Print Setup command that lets you make changes for an individual
document, each application starts with the selections made in the
printer’s Printing Preferences. Preferences are per-user settings. Each computer user can set his or her own printing preferences. Printer Properties—
These are settings that apply to the printer itself, most of which tell
Windows how to communicate with the printer, what capabilities and
optional features it has, and so on. Printer properties also include
settings that determine the initial printing preferences for each user. Print Server Properties— These are settings that apply to all printers used by the computer. They include paper size and form definitions.
The three sets of printer settings are described in the following sections.
Tip If
the Layout tab is not present, you should be able to set the default
page orientation on the Paper/Quality or Effects tabs. If your printer’s
preferences dialog looks like the one shown in Figure 1,
as it does on at least some Hewlett-Packard laser printers, you must
click on an icon to change the orientation. I have no idea why they’d
make such an important setting so unobvious.
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Printing Preferences
If you find yourself
having to change the same page setup settings nearly every time you go
to print something, you save can yourself time by changing the setting
in the Printing Preferences dialog. These settings are used as the
defaults whenever you select a printer in one of your applications.
To change your
personal printing preferences for a particular printer, click Start,
Devices and Printers. Right-click the printer icon and select Printing
Preferences. The number of tabs and the choices they offer vary widely
from printer to printer. I describe them in general terms in Table 1.
Table 1. Printing Preferences Tabs| Tab | What It Controls |
|---|
| Layout | Landscape or portrait paper orientation, the number of pages placed on each sheet, and so on. | | Paper/Quality | Bin or feed slot to use, type of paper, and so on. | | Effects | Page resizing, watermarks, and so on | | Finishing | Stapling, duplexing (two-sided printing), collating, binding, and so on. | | Advanced | Printer features, color management, and in some cases, paper and layout choices. | | Services | Leads to manufacturer web pages and online services. |
If you want to change a printer’s default preferences for all
users, view its Printer Properties, as described in the next section,
and click Printing Defaults on the Advanced tab. This brings up the
Printing Preferences dialog, but the settings serve as the default
settings for all users. They can then customize their printing
preferences from that starting point.
Printer Properties
To make changes to a printer
driver or its physical connection to your computer, or to define some of
the default settings that will be supplied to every user, click Start,
Devices and Printers. Right-click the printer icon and select Printer
Properties. (That’s Printer Properties, not just plain Properties.) This
displays a dialog like that shown in Figure 2.
Tip Each
time you add a printer, Windows creates an icon for it in the Devices
and Printers window. Although each is called a printer, it is actually
just a “pointer” to the printer, much the way a shortcut represents a
document or application on the Windows desktop. A given physical
printer can have multiple icons, each with different default settings.
For example, one could be set to print in landscape orientation on
legal-size paper, whereas another printer could default to portrait
orientation with letter-size paper. Of course, you can always adjust
these settings when you go to print a document, but that can get
tedious. If you create multiple printer icons for the same printer, with
different, descriptive names, you can choose a setup just by selecting
the appropriate printer icon. |
A printer’s Properties dialog box can have any of several tabs. Table 2 shows the general breakdown. Again, the tabs you’ll see can vary depending on the capabilities of your printer.
Table 2. Printer Properties Tabs| Tab | What It Controls |
|---|
| General | This
tab lists the name, location, model number, and features of the
printer. From this tab, you can print a test page. You also can click
the Preferences button to change your personal printing preferences (the
same settings described in the previous section) Some color printers
may have settings for paper quality and color control and buttons for
maintenance functions on this tab. | | Sharing | On this tab, you can alter whether the printer is shared with other network users and what the share name is. | | Ports | On
this tab, you can select the printer’s connection port, add and delete
ports, and in some cases configure the physical connection itself. This
tab also lets you set up additional ports for network-connected
printers. | | Advanced | This
tab controls time availability, printer priority, driver file changes,
spooling options, and advanced printing features such as booklet
printing and page ordering. The first two settings are pertinent to
larger networks and should be handled by a server administrator.
Booklet
printing is worth looking into if you do lots of desktop publishing.
Using this option, you can print pages laid out for stapling together
small pamphlets.
The New Driver button on the Advanced tab lets you replace the current driver with a better one, should this be necessary.
The Printing Defaults button lets you set the default printing
properties supplied to each user. They can then customize them as
described in the previous section. | | Color Management | On this tab, you can set optional color profiles on color printers, if this capability is supported. | | Security | This tab let you control who has access to print, manage printers, or manage documents from this printer. | | Device Settings | The
settings on this tab vary greatly among printers. For example, you can
set paper size in each tray, tell Windows how much RAM is installed in
the printer, and substitute fonts. | | About | Lists the printer’s driver components. | | Utilities | This tab, if present, might contain options for inkjet nozzle cleaning, head cleaning, head alignment, and so on. | | Bluetooth | This
tab, if present, contains information about your Bluetooth printer and
connection in case you need to troubleshoot connection problems. |
Print Server Properties
To define paper sizes or
forms, or to change the location of the spooling folder that is used to
hold data being sent to the printer, click Start, Devices and Printers.
Select any printer icon, and then select Print Server Properties up
near the top of the window.
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