======================================================================= INFORMATION REGARDING HEWLETT PACKARD PLOTTERS ========================================================================= You have selected one of the following plotters: HP 7470A HP 7580B HP ColorPro HP 7475A HP 7586B HP ColorPro with GEC HP 7550A HP DraftPro HP 7580A HP DraftMaster I HP 7585A HP DraftMaster II CONFIGURING YOUR PLOTTER A. SETTING UP THE COMMUNICATIONS PORT 1. From Control Panel, pull down the Setup menu and choose the Communications Port command. A dialog box appears displaying the communications settings. 2. Specify the following settings, then choose the OK button in the Communications Settings box: Baud Rate: 9600 Word Length: 8 Parity: None Stop Bits: 1 Handshake: Hardware (essential for RS-232 port) Port: COM1 or COM2, depending on which port your plotter is connected to. B. SPECIFYING YOUR PLOTTER CONNECTIONS 3. Pull down the Setup menu and choose the Connections command. A dialog box displays a list of printers/plotters and a list of ports. 4. Select "HP Plotter" in the printer list box. 5. Select the desired port from the Connections list box (the same port you specified in the Communications Settings box), and choose OK. If you choose a port that is connected to another device, you must change the other device's port connection before the driver will accept your port choice. C. SETTING UP YOUR PLOTTER IMPORTANT: Be sure you have completed steps 1 through 5 before proceeding with selecting your plotter. SELECTING YOUR PLOTTER AS DEFAULT PRINTER 6. From Control Panel, pull down the Setup menu and choose Printer. The Default Printer box appears, listing all available printers and their assigned port connections. 7. Select "HP plotter on COMx" in the Default Printer list box. 8. Use the Printer Timeouts box to adjust the amount of time Windows waits before sending you messages about plotter problems. a. "Device Not Selected." We recommend that you leave this setting at the default of 15 seconds. This setting controls how much time passes before Windows informs you that your plotter is off-line. b. "Transmission Retry." We recommend initially increasing this setting to a value between 100 and 200 seconds. Plots with many filled areas require a higher Transmission Retry setting. You may need to experiment with various values to determine which works best with your plots. See section C of "Advanced Features" below for important details on this setting. 9. Choose OK in the Default Printer box. The Plotter dialog box appears, displaying default plotter settings. (You will override the defaults by selecting your plotter model in the next step.) 10. Pull down the Device menu and select your plotter. A check mark is placed next to the plotter you select, and the dialog box title changes to your plotter model. IMPORTANT: If your 758xB plotter serial number prefix is less than 2402, select the corresponding 758xA plotter. SELECTING MEDIA SIZE 11. From the Plotter dialog box, pull down the Size menu. The media sizes which your plotter supports display in bold and a check mark appears next to the default media size for your plotter. 12. If you use a size other than the default, select that size, and the check mark moves to your selection. The current media size also appears in the lower left corner of the Plotter dialog box. SETTING PAPER FEED 13. Choose one of the following options: a. "Manual" causes the plotter to stop between pages so you can manually load the next page when plotting multiple copies of a drawing. b. "Automatic" is available only for the following models, and allows continuous plotting on rollfeed or automatically-fed media: 7550, 7586B, DraftMasterII c. "Preloaded" turns off the Insert Paper prompt which appears after you start a plot but before plotting actually begins. SETTING ORIENTATION 14. Choose one of the following options: a. "Portrait" uses the shorter side of your paper as the X-axis. b. "Landscape" uses the longer side of your paper as the X-axis. Default orientation is Portrait; however, many standard plotter applications use Landscape orientation. SELECTING PEN COLORS AND TYPES The driver provides six carousels so you can customize pen combinations. For example, if you plot on both paper and transparency, you can set up one carousel with paper pens, and another with transparency pens. Then you simply select the appropriate carousel for your plot, rather than repeatedly resetting the pen features of a single carousel. The driver also allows you to use more colors than will fit in one carousel. To do this you set more than one carousel as Active. For instructions on using more than one carousel, refer to "Using Multiple Carousels" under "Advanced Features" below. Carousel 1 is the default Active carousel and contains default pen colors and types for your plotter. These defaults display in the right half of the plotter dialog box. (The first time you set up carousels 2-6 there will be no previous settings displayed.) When you are ready to plot, you will place pens in your plotter's carousel according to the settings for the Active carousel. You may accept the default settings in Carousel 1 and skip to step 19, or you may customize individual pen features by using the Carousel menu, as follows: 15. Pull down the Carousel menu. A list of Current and Active carousels appears. a. Select under Current the carousel whose pen attributes you want to specify. Only one carousel at a time may be Current. b. Choose as Active the carousel(s) to be used by your plotter for the next plot job. You may select more than one Active carousel by repeatedly pulling down the Carousel menu and selecting additional carousels. A check appears next to each Active carousel. This setting toggles on and off; select an Active carousel to make it inactive. 16. Select from the Pen Color list the pen number(s) which you want to set. You may select more than one pen by pressing the Shift key while clicking on each desired pen number. All the menu bar items become available, enabling you to change pen color, type, and other options. 17. Pull down the PenColor menu and choose your color from this list of HP colors. Your new color replaces any previous color(s) for the selected pen(s). 18. Pull down the Type menu and choose from the list of available pen types for the selected color. The new type replaces the present type(s) in the carousel list. Pen type abbreviations are: P = Paper T = Transparency V = Vellum R = Rollerball NOTE: When you select a pen type, the driver automatically assigns the correct speed, force, and acceleration. If you use standard HP pen colors and types, you may never need to use the Options menu to adjust these features. SETTING DRAFT AND SAVE BOXES 19. Draft: An "X" in the Draft box signals your plotter to draw wide lines and borders quickly. For final plotting, turn draft mode off by clicking the "X" in the Draft box. Draft mode is recommended for the majority of your plots to reduce plotting time. 20. Save: If the Save box is selected when you choose OK in the Plotter dialog box, the current settings are saved in the WIN.INI file and they become your defaults for that plotter. To execute your settings for the current session only, click on the Save box to remove the "X" before choosing OK. WHAT ABOUT RESET AND CANCEL? Reset returns to their driver default values all the settings in the Plotter dialog box except Draft and Save. Cancel ignores any changes made in the Plotter dialog box during the current session and returns control to the Default Printer box. COMPLETING CONFIGURATION 21. When you have made all necessary changes to the Plotter dialog box, choose the OK button. Your plotter is now properly configured. ADVANCED FEATURES A. CUSTOMIZING PEN FEATURES BEYOND THE BASICS The Options menu in the Plotter dialog box allows you to specify pen speed, force, acceleration and priority. (Force and Acceleration options are unavailable on some plotters.) 1. Choose a Current carousel from the Carousel menu and set its pen colors and types, if necessary. 2. Select the pen number(s) you want to tailor. Only select more than one pen if you want EACH selected pen to receive the SAME speed, force, acceleration and/or priority setting. 3. Pull down the Options menu and select the desired pen feature. Your selected pen(s) for the Current carousel appear in a dialog box with their current settings. 4. Do one of the following: a. To set pen speed, force, and acceleration: Use the up/down arrow scroll box to change pen speed, force, or acceleration for the selected pen(s). Choose OK to save the current setting, Reset to return to the driver default value, or Cancel to exit the feature box without changing the setting. b. To set pen priority: In the Priority box, choose the desired priority for the selected pen(s). For example, you may specify all lines and text to be drawn with a P.3 pen (thin line), and all fill to be drawn with a P.7 pen (wide line) to speed your plotting. Choose OK to save the current setting, Reset to return to the driver default priority, or Cancel to exit the Priority box without changing the setting. 5. Choose OK in the Plotter dialog box when all values are set as desired. B. USING MULTIPLE CAROUSELS Your plotter driver allows you to set up multiple carousels for a single plot, e.g., in case you want to use all 10 colors on a single drawing. The plotter uses all the colors in the first Active carousel, then the Spooler prompts you to change carousels in the plotter, and then the plotter completes the drawing using the next Active carousel. To receive the Change Carousel prompt, your application screen MUST be sized so that the Spooler icon is visible during plotting. When the icon blinks, double click on the icon to display its message. IMPORTANT: The driver minimizes bleeding of colors by using the colors in each carousel in the following sequence, regardless of how they are numbered in the carousel: 1. Yellow 2. Orange 3. Red 4. Green 5. Red-Violet 6. Aqua 7. Brown 8. Violet 9. Blue 10. Black Because all the pens in one carousel are used before the next carousel is introduced, bleeding is more likely if you place darker pens in Carousel 1 and lighter pens in subsequent carousels. 1. To set a new carousel, pull down the Carousel menu, and select as Current the carousel you want to set up. Select as Active each carousel you want used for your next plot. 2. Select the number of the first pen you want to set. All the menu bar options become available, enabling you to set pen color, type, speed, force, acceleration and priority. 3. Set any pen options you want as described above under "Selecting Pen Colors and Types" and "Customizing Pen Features Beyond the Basics." 4. Repeat steps 1 through 3 for each carousel you want to set up, then choose OK in the Plotter dialog box to accept the current settings. Before plotting, place pens in the plotter's carousel according to the pens you specified for the first Active carousel. When you are prompted to change carousels during plotting, replace the pens in the plotter's carousel with the pens you specified for the next Active carousel. C. MORE ON TRANSMISSION RETRY When you start a plotting job, Windows sends data to your plotter at a constant transmission rate. Because plotters cannot plot at the same speed at which data is transmitted, they have buffers that receive and store data while they plot. When the buffer fills, the plotter stops accepting data from Windows until the buffer is able to accept more data. The Transmission Retry setting tells Windows how long to wait after your plotter stops accepting data before trying to send it more data. If the specified amount of time passes and your plotter still does not accept data, Windows stops the plot and displays an error message. The error message offers the option to Retry or Cancel the plot. In most cases, Retry enables the plot to complete properly. However, to avoid this disruption of plotting, we recommend that you increase the Transmission Retry setting. This is especially important for the following plotters which have large memory buffers that may delay data acceptance for longer than the default of 45 seconds: ColorPro with GEC 7475 7550 758XB DraftPro DraftMaster I/II D. UNDERSTANDING PLOTTER SETTINGS IN YOUR WIN.INI FILE Your WIN.INI file contains settings for many Microsoft Windows features and Windows applications. Refer to Appendix A, "Customizing Your WIN.INI File," of the Microsoft Windows User's Guide for descriptions of these settings. Your plotter driver adds a [Plotter Model] section to the WIN.INI file. All plotter settings in this section of the file can be changed through Control Panel, so it may never be necessary for you to work directly in this file. And because some of these settings are determined by your plotter model, they should be changed ONLY in Control Panel where incorrect options for your plotter are unavailable. The following descriptions of the plotter settings are provided for your reference. Current Carousel Indicates which carousel displays as Current when you enter the Plotter dialog box. PaperFeed 0 = Single Sheet (Manual load) 1 = Automatic This setting is 0 for all plotters except those with automatic paperfeed (7550, 7586B and DraftMasterII). Preloaded 0 = Paper is not preloaded (default) 1 = Paper is preloaded Orientation 0 = Portrait Mode 1 = Landscape Mode Draft 0 = Final mode 1 = Draft mode (default) Active Carousels 0 = Inactive 1 = Active Each of the six carousels is represented by the value in its respective position to the right of the "ActiveCarousels=" phrase. Size The first value after "Size=" represents media size as follows: 0-4 = A-E size media 5-9 = A4-A0 size media The second value applies only to roll media and represents plot length: 10 = 24 X 36-inch roll media 11 = 36 X 48-inch roll media C1..C6 These settings display specific carousel information for Carousels 1 (C1) through 6 (C6). Each line represents a carousel's eight pens, each with six characteristics listed in the following order: color, type, speed, force, acceleration, priority This order repeats across the line for each pen. ======================================================================= END OF README FILE =======================================================================