Papercut issue _ about to walk out of my job!

[MrWu]

Hi all

 

Probably more a sounding off.

 

I should have been more outspoken but SMT has forced my hand to have multi vendor (Konica, Tosh and Canon) running under one Papercut ecosystem

 

The latest disaster, being open evening we tried to install a new Canon copier that was bought on the basis it was cheap..

 

Well, Canon was hopeless with support and cut a long story short we went from PCut ver 1.6 to 1.8 and it messed up all the Konica big time (now the release queue have slowed completely down with printing)

 

Because the Papercut licence was bought from Tosh vendor, Konica washed their hands off it .. no ones taking ownership now as I warned management about it .. now I’ve been dumped with the issue and told I need to sort it out or the head teacher will be round tomorrow and things won’t be good ...

 

Question is, anyone had issues with 1.82 with Konica Bizhub copiers ?

 

They absolutely hated being updated to 1.82...

 

Anyone build and support their own Papercut server woth multi vendor copiers (I dont think anyone wants to !)

Edited September 26, 2018 by MrWu

[mavhc]

Point to the 17 emails you sent warning this sort of thing might happen, not like it's your fault.

 

Can you go back to 1.6?

[Big_Ted]

#1

Well, Canon was hopeless with support and cut a long story short we went from PCut ver 1.6 to 1.8 and it messed up all the Konica big time (now the release queue have slowed completely down with printing)

 

do you mean version 16 to version 18?

If so, what build of 18 are you on?

Are the Konica devices running iOptions with the latest FW?

In what way have they slowed down, is it just print release on the Konicas that is slow? Send a 1 page note pad doc, what part is slow? leaving the queue or the time from leaving the queue to printing out?

 

Because the Papercut licence was bought from Tosh vendor, Konica washed their hands off it .. no ones taking ownership now as I warned management about it .. now I’ve been dumped with the issue and told I need to sort it out or the head teacher will be round tomorrow and things won’t be good ...

 

When buying from multiple vendors your contract needs to be crystal clear where the support will come from. You can't expect a Toshiba dealer to understand and fix Konica embedded software issues.

 

Question is, anyone had issues with 1.82 with Konica Bizhub copiers ?

Yes, here: https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/KnownIssuesKonicaMinolta

 

Anyone build and support their own Papercut server woth multi vendor copiers (I dont think anyone wants to !)

 

Multi vendor setups are not unusual at all, the main issue would be if you planned to have all the devices on the same virtual queue and finding a good driver.

 

 

I would:

enable debugging in two places and to send papercut the log files.

The two places are the PaperCut Application Server and PaperCut Print Provider.

http://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/HowToEnableDebugInNG

http://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/HowToEnableDebugInThePrintProvider

 

Once you have enabled debug in these two places please either reproduce the error (if possible) or wait until the error reproduces it itself.

 

If you are running PaperCut version 13.2 or newer you can obtain the log files from the Options -> Advanced tab by clicking on "Download diagnostic files and send to support." If you have a "Secondary Server", you will need to quickly grab the PaperCut Print Provider logs from that server as discussed in the KB article.

 

If you are running PaperCut version 13.1 or older, please zip and email the logs from the KB article above. Namely [app-path]\server\logs*.* and [app-path]\providers\print[os]\print-provider.log.*

 

They will also need the following information:

 

Date and time of print

Name of the user

Name of the print job

IP/Name of the printer

Name/IP of release device

Date time of release

 

get the event logs as well:

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/LogPrintJobsInEventViewer

 

See if the time the job gets spooled and time to output is reasonable.

[MrWu]

Point to the 17 emails you sent warning this sort of thing might happen, not like it's your fault.

 

Can you go back to 1.6?

 

Yes, frustrating when the sort of response is ... we appreciate the warning but that’s where IT is responsible for fixing things, and any way can’t be that hard right ?

 

I’ve got a server built in parallel hoping to run 16 and migrate a few over to test ... thankfully I’ve got the production one to print, but a little slower, but at least it prints. We will see this morning though!

[MrWu]

#1

 

 

do you mean version 16 to version 18?

If so, what build of 18 are you on?

Are the Konica devices running iOptions with the latest FW?

In what way have they slowed down, is it just print release on the Konicas that is slow? Send a 1 page note pad doc, what part is slow? leaving the queue or the time from leaving the queue to printing out?

 

 

 

When buying from multiple vendors your contract needs to be crystal clear where the support will come from. You can't expect a Toshiba dealer to understand and fix Konica embedded software issues.

 

 

Yes, here: https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/KnownIssuesKonicaMinolta

 

 

 

Multi vendor setups are not unusual at all, the main issue would be if you planned to have all the devices on the same virtual queue and finding a good driver.

 

 

I would:

enable debugging in two places and to send papercut the log files.

The two places are the PaperCut Application Server and PaperCut Print Provider.

http://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/HowToEnableDebugInNG

http://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/HowToEnableDebugInThePrintProvider

 

Once you have enabled debug in these two places please either reproduce the error (if possible) or wait until the error reproduces it itself.

 

If you are running PaperCut version 13.2 or newer you can obtain the log files from the Options -> Advanced tab by clicking on "Download diagnostic files and send to support." If you have a "Secondary Server", you will need to quickly grab the PaperCut Print Provider logs from that server as discussed in the KB article.

 

If you are running PaperCut version 13.1 or older, please zip and email the logs from the KB article above. Namely [app-path]\server\logs*.* and [app-path]\providers\print[os]\print-provider.log.*

 

They will also need the following information:

 

Date and time of print

Name of the user

Name of the print job

IP/Name of the printer

Name/IP of release device

Date time of release

 

get the event logs as well:

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/LogPrintJobsInEventViewer

 

See if the time the job gets spooled and time to output is reasonable.

 

 

Thank you for this !

 

It’s from 16 to 18.2

I will check Firmware on the Konicas. They are looked after by a copier company ..will reply back to this post

It seems (and I think this is system wide and effected another brand of copier) it’s the release queue to the device itself, that is the doc appeared on the copier queue and you press the print button on the device... mainly the first page comes out quickly, then subsequently the second job lags and so on. Now it happened to a Tosh on a separate print queue too, but that was eliminated with a reboot so far.

[3s-gtech]

Because the Papercut licence was bought from Tosh vendor, Konica washed their hands off it .. no ones taking ownership now as I warned management about it .. now I’ve been dumped with the issue and told I need to sort it out or the head teacher will be round tomorrow and things won’t be good!

 

That's not how employment works. They can't make a mess like that, dump it on you, then threaten you! If that's how you're treated professionally, speak to your union. If you stressed on this to the point of going off sick they'd be far up the creek!

[jamesrhart]

Hi,

 

Have you installed the very latest release? We had a similar issue with our Canon copiers about 1-2 weeks ago, the workaround was to disable hardware page count, but shortly after we had the workaround they released a fix into the very latest build, basically the print provider keeps crashing and we were seeing big delays or jobs disappearing, albeit we are on all Canons (bar one Xerox, but that has a completely separate follow me queue and also we purchase everything from a single supplier).

[dfergusson]

What version of Papercut 18.2.?

 

And what ports are you using on the printers, Papercut TCP/IP or Standard TCP/IP

If you are using Papercut TCP/IP do you have "Validate page counts after printing (hardware check) enabled?

[MrWu]

Thanks all

 

Going to check it all now, still slow and follow me queue has errors, but it is printing intermittently..

 

I'm on Version: 18.2.4 (Build 46020)

 

Where do I disable hardware check error on the Papercut port? I can try this..

[MrWu]

This is what the queue is doing at the moment, its in error state and printing slowly, I delete the error documents, and some new documents will go into error status

 

[dfergusson]

Thanks all

Where do I disable hardware check error on the Papercut port? I can try this..

 

On your print server, bring up printers, right click on one of printers and click on properties and then click on ports.

Under description will tell you if it a Papercut TCP/IP port or Standard TCP/IP Port

[dfergusson]

This is what the queue is doing at the moment, its in error state and printing slowly, I delete the error documents, and some new documents will go into error status

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]50355[/ATTACH]

 

What queue are you showing in screenshot? is that a follow you printer queue or normal printer queue?

Edited September 27, 2018 by dfergusson

[MrWu]

What queue are you showing in screenshot? is that a follow you printer queue or normal printer queue?

 

This is in the Follow me queue, I think lots of errors are appearing and slowing down printing?

[dfergusson]

This is in the Follow me queue, I think lots of errors are appearing and slowing down printing?

 

What port have you set for follow me queue?

[jamesrhart]

This is the error we had:

 

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/KnownIssues/#i14526

 

But as I say it is resolved in the very latest version, and may not be the same issue you are experiencing, although there are similarities.

[dfergusson]

Here are thing you can check to improve Papercut Printer reliability.

 

For uses with Follow You Queues

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/SetupNulPortOnWindows

 

Other Printer features that you can disable

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/EnableAdvancedPrintingFeatures

https://www.papercut.com/kb/Main/FixingPrintSpoolerCrashes

Edited September 27, 2018 by dfergusson

[MrWu]

What port have you set for follow me queue?

 

The previous support company (which washed their hands of it since we bought Papercut licence elsewhere) set up several:

 

[MrWu]

Also should there be prints 'paused' on some physical printer queues?

[dfergusson]

This is how our is setup for our Follow You Queue

 

 

I also noticed that you have Papercut TCP/IP Queues, check if you have Hardware checking enabled under Papercut printers.

 

 

If you are using Hardware check, be worth you updating to version below to fix Hardware Checks enable crashing.

 

13 September 2018 - PaperCut MF 18.2.5 (Build 46226)

This is a Maintenance Release for 18.2 and contains the following changes:

 

Fixes:

Windows Print Provider: Fixed an issue that could cause the Print Provider to crash when Hardware Checks are enabled (since 18.2.4).

Admin web interface: Fixed missing translations for Find-Me Printing configuration.

Edited September 27, 2018 by dfergusson

[dfergusson]

Something you might also want to enable for your Follow You Virtual Queues under Papercut, Printer, is enable "Hide document names for jobs in this queue"

 

[dfergusson]

Also should there be prints 'paused' on some physical printer queues?[ATTACH=CONFIG]50363[/ATTACH]

 

No, unless you set that you have setup Hold/Release Queue Settings on physical printer queue under Papercut, Printers by mistake?

 

[dfergusson]

These are some changes I would recommend making, we had recent issue with Papercut printing and these solved all of our issues.

 

That port for follow me queues are all set to Nul:

Unchecked Enable bidirectional on all printers including Followyou

Unchecked Enable Advanced Printing Features for all printers including Followyou (Located under Advanced Tab under printers properties)

If you are using Papercut Port, change them to Standard TCP/IP Port

 

So example of when we had Papercut ports and moved back to Standard Ports

 

For Papercut, under Printers:

unchecked Validate page counts after printing (hardware check) for all printers

Ensure that Enable hold/release queue is only enabled for Follow you queue (Virtual) unless there reason why it set to physical.

 

I hope the above is of help.

Edited September 27, 2018 by dfergusson

[MrWu]

You guys rock!

 

I have applied and checked all of your suggetions and reset the queues to how @dfergusson set up, all errors gone in the Follow me queue and printer seems ok, will carry on testing ! Thank you all from the bottom of my heart !

[MrWu]

One more quick question, It pops up with colour printing charge per page even on the screen for a B&W Copier (its set as a Greyscale disable colour detection on the hardware queue) should the follow me queue be set to Black and White instead? At the moment it's set as colour:

 

[dfergusson]

One more quick question, It pops up with colour printing charge per page even on the screen for a B&W Copier (its set as a Greyscale disable colour detection on the hardware queue) should the follow me queue be set to Black and White instead? At the moment it's set as colour:

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]50372[/ATTACH]

 

Yes if you got dedicated FollowyouMono virtual queue "This is a grayscale printer (disable color detection and charge all jobs as grayscale)"

 

And also you can set the following for FollowyouMono.

 

Also On your B&W printers set "This is a grayscale printer (disable color detection and charge all jobs as grayscale)"

 

For our FollowYouColour Virtual Queue we have this is set to "This is a color printer (use standard detection)"

For our Colour Copies we have this set "This is a color printer (use page-level detection)"

 

More info on these setting here: https://www.papercut.com/support/resources/manuals/ng-mf/applicationserver/topics/printer-color-detection.html

Edited September 27, 2018 by dfergusson