trd10523@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Die Hard Cub Fan) (10/04/90)
A friend of mine is currently using an IBM PS/2 Model 50 to run Word Perfect 5.0 at her office. She does a lot of work with different fonts in the same document, and WP downlines them to an HP Laserjet II. The fonts are created with Bitstream Charter software. The problem is this: the printer often loses track of where the fonts are located in it's memory (I think) and it reverts to normal-looking text, ignoring WP's font commands. My local computer dealer refers to this problem as "Font Overload" - loading too much font information to the printer [she does use big fonts]. His suggestions to fix the problem involve throwing hardware at it until it goes away in the form of Font Cartridges or RAM exapnsion. Is anyone out there familiar with this situation? The most reasonable solution does seem to be adding 1 Meg of RAM to the printer, but I would like to know for sure before I tell them to spend $200 on it. Is this maybe just a bug in the printer driver? WP doesn't think so, but version 5.1 is on the way to the office. Any advice would be greatly appreicated. -- /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / Todd Davis INTERNET: trd10523@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu / / Computer Engineering Student COORDINATES: 40 06' 47" N / 88 13' 35 W / / University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign / ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
price@chakra.unl.edu (Chad Price) (10/06/90)
In <1990Oct4.025140.15232@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> trd10523@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Die Hard Cub Fan) writes: >A friend of mine is currently using an IBM PS/2 Model 50 to run Word Perfect >5.0 at her office. >She does a lot of work with different fonts in the same document, and WP >downlines them to an HP Laserjet II. The fonts are created with Bitstream >Charter software. >The problem is this: the printer often loses track of where the fonts are >located in it's memory (I think) and it reverts to normal-looking text, >ignoring WP's font commands. More information would be useful; but in the absence of that, I will assume that you are referring to an Error 20 message from the HP - which says that it is out of memory. I have a Z-386 and a PS/2 Med 50 running the exact same copies of WP 5.1. The IBM has the same problem and the Zenith does not. THe only conclusion I have been able to reach is that there is a problem with the PS/2 parallel port communications. My "cure" is a work-around. I have decreased the amount of fonts which are downloaded prior to document printing. I now only load 2-3 fonts as the printer initialization, and the problem is much reduced - it seems to only appear after about 20 or so pages of text are printed now. Hope this helps - if not, post more explicit details. Chad Price price@fergvax.unl.edu
trd10523@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Die Hard Cub Fan) (10/08/90)
Well, I got lots of email on this subject, and I thank everyone for it. The general idea was that the printer sets a priority on buffering incoming text over soft fonts. When the text buffer needed exceeds the space available in memory, then the fonts get dumped. The solution is definitely a RAM expansion, if not a font cartridge. An addition of 2 Meg was suggested (instead of 1 Meg) in order to obtain compatibility with certain cartridges which would require it. Other suggestions included having WP load the fonts selectively rather than having them flagged as permanent in the printer definition; that helps but does not always cure it. The office will be purchasing a Pacific 2 Meg board for $199 (from Elek-Tek, a mail-order outfit with showrooms in the Chicago area). Thanks again for all the help people provided. -- /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// / Todd Davis INTERNET: trd10523@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu / / Computer Engineering Student COORDINATES: 40 06' 47" N / 88 13' 35 W / / University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign / ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////