Problem printing to Epson p800 with new Mojave print dialogue

[John Chardine]

The subject is slightly misleading. I will explain. I have an Epson p800 connected to a Mac running the latest Mojave. Epson print driver is up-to-date. I mainly print from Lightroom on matte papers and the p800 is set to MK. That all works fine still. However, after my "upgrade" to Mojave, when printing from any Apple software product such as Safari, Preview, Mail (plain paper, B/W quickies usually), the printer LCD screen tells me that the print driver is calling for an ink change from MK to PK and will not print unless I change inks- I don't. This is when I have the Media type and Ink set to matte.

Digging into this a little I've noticed two different dialogue boxes when printing from non-Apple software vs. Apple software- please see attachments. I've contacted Epson and Apple on this and neither have heard of the issue before, nor can they solve it, and both are blaming each other.

I would dearly love to hear if anyone else has seen this and if so if they have figured out a fix.

[BobShaw]

Well I don't have Mojave but this box looks exactly like High Sierra.
The media type is shown in your photo as Photo Paper and PK ink.
Change it to a matte or plain paper and Matte Ink or Last Used.
Then Save it as a preset.

[John Chardine]

Thanks. That dialogue is the one that works! I just didn't bother to set it for the screen capture. The other dialogue is the culprit. If I use it, set matte paper and MK ink, the printer (set to MK) beeps and gives me a warning that the printer driver is requesting a change of black in to PK.

[Wayne Fox]

I’m a little confused.  It may be helpful to see the dialog that doesn’t work.

[Kenneth Sky]

I've got a better idea Just buy a cheap printer for plain paper printing and save your high priced ink for fine art printing.

[BobShaw]

The other dialogue is the culprit. If I use it, set matte paper and MK ink, the printer (set to MK) beeps and gives me a warning that the printer driver is requesting a change of black in to PK.

I'm confused also. Did you save it as a preset and use that preset? I think the preset may over-ride what you set.
I use my P800 to print A4 brochures on plain paper all the time using either PK or MK, whatever is last used and they look fine.
Using 80mL cartridges is cheaper than using a small printer and 15mL cartridges and keeps the printer heads clean.

[John Chardine]

Sorry for the confusion and I really appreciate folks trying to help on this one. It's a hard one to explain.

Ok, the dialogue that comes up when I print from Apple software (e.g., Safari, Preview, Mail etc) is attached. THIS IS THE ONE THAT DOES NOT WORK. You can see that I have Plain paper set as the Media type and Ink is set to Matte Black.
When I hit Print from this dialogue set thusly, the p800, WHICH IS SET TO MK, does its thing for a few seconds then beeps and then gives me the attached Notice asking to change to black ink type specified by the printer driver.

As the printer is set to MK and the driver is set to MK, this notice does not make sense.

For the record, I have the newest printer drivers, have reset my printing system and re-added the printer, all to no avail.

By the way, failure to print as described above occurs regardless of the Media type selected (I had originally thought it had something to do with printing on Plain paper).

[rdonson]

What is the preset "Plain paper -1" set to do???

[John Chardine]

The preset just sets plain paper and matte ink.

[Wayne Fox]

I rarely need to print a normal document to plain paper so I use my p5000.  Handful of sheets a year. Would be foolish to buy a cheap printer for this task when I have a perfectly fine p5000 sitting next to me.  As far as “high priced ink”,  I believe the ink in those little cheap printer costs way more than the large capacity cartridges in the larger printers.

I’m seeing some oddness when printing from Preview and Safari using Mojave to a p5000 in the dialog box, getting multiple places to enter the same information.  I have 3 places where it asks for paper type, defaulting to Luster.  See attached screen shots.  The third one is only if I scroll all the way to the bottom.  The only way I could get it to print is to scroll all the way and make sure all the settings were correct including the paper choice.

If I don’t set the paper type to plain paper in all 3 locations (including the one when you scroll all the way to the bottom), I get the same problem ... it asks for PK ink.  I’m assuming that unless all 3 locations say plain paper it thinks Luster paper is in.

[BobShaw]

Now you have two different Apple dialogue boxes.
The first was Printer Settings and this is Printer Features?

[John Chardine]

That is true. If you print from Apple software such as Safari, Preview, Mail, you get the dialogue box which says "Printer Features" (this is the one that doesn't work). If you print from non-Apple software like Chrome, Adobe products, Microsoft products, you get a dialogue box which says "Printer settings"- this one works fine.

[John Chardine]

I rarely need to print a normal document to plain paper so I use my p5000.  Handful of sheets a year. Would be foolish to buy a cheap printer for this task when I have a perfectly fine p5000 sitting next to me.  As far as “high priced ink”,  I believe the ink in those little cheap printer costs way more than the large capacity cartridges in the larger printers.

I’m seeing some oddness when printing from Preview and Safari using Mojave to a p5000 in the dialog box, getting multiple places to enter the same information.  I have 3 places where it asks for paper type, defaulting to Luster.  See attached screen shots.  The third one is only if I scroll all the way to the bottom.  The only way I could get it to print is to scroll all the way and make sure all the settings were correct including the paper choice.

If I don’t set the paper type to plain paper in all 3 locations (including the one when you scroll all the way to the bottom), I get the same problem ... it asks for PK ink.  I’m assuming that unless all 3 locations say plain paper it thinks Luster paper is in.

Hi Wayne- I am relieved that someone else can see this. Like I said earlier, the response I got from Epson was "talk to Apple" and vice versa from Apple. What is your hunch about which company is best to re-approach to define the issue?

Also, now I see what a mess this dialogue box is, with many options to set, some duplicates, and no indication that there are more options if you scroll down. By the way, with the p800, I only see two places to set paper or media type, one close to the top, and one close to bottom. If I set those correctly, and the ink type, I still can't print. Can't see the third place for paper type you mention.

[BobShaw]

If you print from Apple software such as Safari, Preview, Mail, you get the dialogue box which says "Printer Features" (this is the one that doesn't work). If you print from non-Apple software like Chrome, Adobe products, Microsoft products, you get a dialogue box which says "Printer settings"- this one works fine.

That is defining the problem. Are you using version 10.16 of the Epson Driver?
If so I would send both pictures to Epson support.

If it is not too late use a Time Machine backup to restore High Sierra.

[John Chardine]

Yes Bob. Using the latest driver.

[Wayne Fox]

Mojave 10.14.2 update does not resolve this.  Not sure who is to blame, but actually seems an apple problem since all 3rd party apps work fine, only apple apps seem to have this problem. However, guessing only Epson can help get it resolved with Apple.

[PatCastaldo]

Hi — I just joined because I was having this same problem, and after reading this (I thought it was all apps), I did some digging — it's because Apple apps are signed with a hardened runtime that doesn't allow them to run other code — and the printer drivers are code.

I found a good forum on MacRumors that goes into this:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/can-we-talk-for-a-second-about-the-printer-dialogs-in-mojave.2148321/

My whole workflow has been messed up because I have an assistant do the printing out of preview instead of having to load photoshop and illustrator on their machine.

We filed a bug report with Apple — it's their fault on this one, not Epson (or other print makers).

[PatCastaldo]

I was digging through the release notes of the latest release and Apple finally admitted the problem — "On macOS 10.14.x, for executables using the hardened runtime, PDEs load only if the host executable has the Disable Library Validation Entitlement."

So, based this, I don't think there's any fixing coming until at least 10.15.

[Jane]

I was just researching a variant on this problem and came across this thread. Cannot see that the issue has been clarified elsewhere. I am printing with the ImagePrint app to the P800 in Mojave, so not the Apple or Photoshop or Lightroom dialogue. The problem is that printing went fine this morning as has been usual in Mojave on smaller, gloss papers sizes ( to wit: Harmon by Hahnemuhle gloss baryta ) but fails when settings are switched for the black ink to matte and the paper size to 17-22, which I had problem locating at first first . ( What is the alternative designation for that size? ). Finally did get 17 X 22 in the printer itself and created a custom size in ImagePrint ( maybe I missed the size given with a alternative designation ). On prompts, I updated the printer driver ( which may not have needed updating ), the printer firmware, and an update to the ImagePrint App. Of course it's Saturday, so not a creature is stirring at Epson or ImagePrint. All the settings are correct and then printer just ignores the Print command.

Have I missed a solution to this? Would be grateful for any ideas.

[Jane]

Issue outlined previouslywith ImagePrint  persists into Mac OS 10.14.5. Spoke to a second-tier Apple tech, who was unable to unearth any reference to printing problems in Mojave. Really! I finally printed out of Photoshop, having first discovered that I could only access the ICC profiles after reverting to the regular driver for the P800- the driver update apparently eset the default to the 'Air' version of the printer driver, which does not have the Epson paper profiles incorporated in the download. I was able to print out of Photoshop with the matte black ink on Epson's 17 X 22" Ultrasmooth fine art paper, but failed miserably at doing the same with ImagePrint, where I had to create a custom 17 X 22" paper size, which I suspect the printer does not recognize as a valid setting. Just a guess.