Older Z3200 Win7 driver available from anyone?

[Royce Howland]

Hey all Z3200 fans. I have a couple of vexing problems with the Z3200 I'm running, and no way no how have I been able to resolve them. Including with HP support; they don't really support the Z3200 any more. The tl;dr request is to ask if anyone has archived an older HP Win7 Pro driver that they could forward to me. I'm trying to rule driver version in or out as the source of my issues.

I have two driver versions: version 61.192.11805.100 (current version, release in July 2019), and version 61.182.21112.200 (released in May 2018). The problems persist on both. So ideally I'm looking for whatever driver immediately preceded the one from May 2018. Thanks in advance on that.

I'll post more about the issues I'm trying to troubleshoot once I've exhausted the last couple of things I'm trying. But in brief, the two biggest problems are these:

#1: I can't get Gloss Enhancer to lay down on any glossy paper, with either of the above drivers, from any printing software, on Win 7 Pro or Win 10 Pro. This includes every combination and permutation of driver settings that I can think of, using canned HP media types as well as paper vendor media types and my own custom media types, and then all of the hoop-jumping with deleting & reinstalling drivers, rebooting the printer & computers, etc. I know GE works fine in the printer hardware itself because I can submit jobs to the internal print server through the web interface, and they print with GE just fine. But that's a lousy alternative to Qimage job management, involves some black box colour management that has done weird things I can't understand, and also has certain other workflow restrictions that I don't want to put up with. What I really want is to get GE working through the print driver in the normal way. But after 3+ months of fighting with this, searching the net for every troubleshooting tip I could find (including threads here on LuLa), and calling in HP via a support ticket which they closed without resolution, I've been unsuccessful. Maybe the last straw is trying an older driver.

#2: I can't print on 17x22 cut sheets. The sheets load fine, I can create paper presets and run internal ICC profiles fine, and I can queue up jobs through Qimage or whatever just fine. But as soon as the job hits the point it would start to print (after "receiving data"), the printer stops with the message "load roll for next job". Again, I've scoured the net for this issue and tried many combinations of driver settings & print job specs, and so far I simply can't get the printer to print jobs on 17x22 sheets. As with #1, if I submit the print job via the internal print server's web interface, the job prints fine on the sheet.

Thanks in advance for any links to an older driver, or other troubleshooting tips on either #1 or #2...

[Ernst Dinkla]

I never use "Oversize" so printing over the edges of the paper. There are several limitations to that setting that may occur in your case. You may not see a warning from the driver in that case if you go by the Qimage Ultimate interface. Its interaction with the HP printer drivers is flawed in more ways, as described below. You could try an old Qimage Studio version with the two printer icons still on top, might be still available for download.


Sheet 17x22 and Gloss Enhancer:
Qimage Ultimate or a Qimage older version where the printer driver settings are still made in the top row printer icon next to the printer start icon ?  I ask this because for several years QU has a flawed interaction with the HP PCL3 driver. Settings made in QU that directly address the printer driver work well with Epson and Canon drivers but simply do not work correctly with the HP PCL3 driver. At the end of all my settings in QU my last step is opening the driver again, check, reset to what it should be and click OK in the driver. Which then may report wrong settings in QU's interface but I ignore that. In the end the driver decides what setting is used, not the QU interface driver settings. Portrait/landscape position and media choices can be affected, QU looses track of the media choices when new media choices are installed in the driver. Probably happens beyond a certain number of installed media choices. This can be a problem too when an old print log file is recalled in QU, not everything is set correctly in the printer driver then. I use to read the log info then and see what profile is used and select the media in the driver based on that information. Your problem can be that QU shows a glossy paper as the media choice while the driver actually has a matte media in mind so without gloss enhancer. Always do the driver settings at the end, check resolution, setting, gloss enhancer, etc and then OK.

Use HP print preview despite its non-CM appearence as it shows whether the print page is in portrait or in landscape mode on the roll/sheet. It can go wrong based on the bad QU interaction as well but also because the HP driver can turn the print page when the sheet/roll size does not allow it printed in the intended way. Some 36/44"rolls are smaller than the 914/1118mm they should be, printer measures and "thinks" I have to flip the print page. Using custom sizes in the driver that are 1mm smaller solves that for 99% of teh print jobs.

I have complained about that change in QU years ago and asked to keep that printer driver settings icon in the top bar. Never got it back. About a year ago Mike gave me a hot key that sets the driver back to the default setting while the other QU settings are not altered then so the printer profile choice etc stays. I really wish HP users could have the simple interface back of the old QU but with the other QU enhancements up to today. Let the driver settings info go two ways, to the printer and to QU but block QU's settings to the driver and grey out the settings of QU where it shows the HP driver settings. I also wonder how QU acts with the new HP wide format printer.

Given your experience that another driver does not give issues I would look for what I decribed above, it is not a PCL3 driver issue. Nevertheless:

Some questions.
Plain Z3200 or Z3200-PS,  and for both A or B version? I only have Z3200-PS drivers (PCL3 is universal though) and version A firmware archived.
PCL3 driver (rasterdriver) ?

While you are in the driver check both the printer measured size of the sheet or whether it reports the printer measured roll width. If the last is the case then your problem is in the printer and another solution is needed than described here. When you use the sheet insert mode without skew check then an arbitrary number is quoted for the length (always the same whatever size sheet is inserted) and this length may be in conflict with the 17x22 size sheet. Tried to load the same sheet as portrait and landscape with the same result?

There could also be an issue with the flip flop sensor/switch in the insert slit. After a roll or sheet is loaded the position of the switch handle in the insert slit is different. It points backwards with a sheet loaded, it points forward with a roll loaded. Maybe it sticks in one position due to dirt.


Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst

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