HPZ3200 and Qimage Media type issue

[sharadn]

My Qimage is not picking up some of my media types even though they are in the print driver. The media type does not load into Qimage even when I press the shift properties in Qimage. On Mike Chaneys site he seems to think that the print driver needs to be reinstalled. I hope not as that is a PIA.

[Kyle Jackson]

Hi, I know nothing about Qimage but I wonder if refreshing the paper list in HP's driver would help? Just use the paper sync option in HP Utility to make sure all papers stored in the printer are on the PC and vice versa.

[sharadn]

I tried that and it seems that that everything is up to date. On DP review someone suggested to use the "reset button" in Qimage. See the screen shot. I am not sure what this will do but I suppose it is worth a try.
Here is the link to the DPR forum post:
https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/68370550

[sharadn]

I asked Mike Chaney (He writes the code for Qimage). This is his response.
Are they custom media types you have added?  If so, the Z3200 driver has always had a long list of bugs, one of which is related to the driver having issues once you add more than a few custom media types.  Holding Shift while you click "Properties" to open the driver in Qimage does reset the driver (to Windows defaults) so if you don't see the media types in the driver at that point, the driver may need to be reinstalled or you may need to clear the custom media types and re-add them.

If Windows printing preferences shows the media types but Shift-Properties in Qimage doesn't, then the 64 bit version of the driver has the custom media types but the 32 bit version of the driver (which Qimage uses) does not.  Once the 64 and 32 bit versions of the driver diverge/disagree, driver bugs likely came into play and it might be time to uninstall the driver and reinstall it, starting from scratch.

None of that will affect your Qimage saved settings as long as you reinstall the driver under the same name.  So note/copy the name of the printer and when you reinstall it, make sure it has the same name.  The only thing that could cause a problem with loading saved info is if the old printer was named "HP Z3200 Series" and the new one is named "HP Z3200 Series on USB001".  The names have to be the same when you reinstall.

Regards,
Mike

[sharadn]

It seems like I need a 32bit driver. Does someone have one I have get a copy of?

[Kyle Jackson]

Hi, the files you sent me last year from your install disk include the 32-bit driver. That PCL3 driver is from 2012, and it's been a good version for me. (Anything newer than that appears to the V3 or later "universal" drivers with broken functionality for our Z-series printers.)

I don't know if the HP installer will let you add the 32-bit version to the 64-bit version. If it doesn't you may need to manually add the 32-bit version by browsing to it on the disc, right-click on the .inf file, and select Install I guess (not sure tbh). I dunno what that will do to your existing 64-bit driver tho. Hopefully they can co-exist.

Seems like a lot of finicky needs for this Qimage thing, whatever it does. Is it really necessary? Especially if it can't handle 64-bit. I just print thru the HP driver (from PS).

Cheers

[sharadn]

The feature that I need the most from Qimage is that it will automatically pickup the file name and path and other pertinent printing information and print it in the border. When I need to reference a print that I made 10 years ago this helps me find the file. If there are other printing programs that can do this I would be interested.
Do you know if I reinstall the driver will it synchronize the 64 and 32 bit drivers? Will I lose the custom paper types and ICC profiles that I had created with the HP Utility program?
I asked Mike this-When you say "clear the custom media types" do you mean copy them out of the color directory and put them back after the reinstall or do you mean that I would have to delete them with my HP Utility preset manager and re-create these profiles with my printer again?

[Kyle Jackson]

No idea tbh. I think your ICC profiles should be fine since they're saved elsewhere in the Windows spool folder. I say that because I find it's usually a folder that keeps growing, I don't think I've ever seen ICC profiles disappear, even when completely uninstalling the driver etc. I have years of old crap piled up in there lol...

I don't know what HP Utility will do when you run paper sync, like will it do both drivers or just one, and which one. Maybe it will actually show 2 separate printers installed, no idea.

Seems messy/awkward... But if it's an important part of your workflow I understand the desire to make it work again. If it worked fine before I wonder what changed so that now Qimage is missing paper types.