[rescue] OT: LPR & 9100

[Eric Webb]

On Tuesday 14 September 2004 03:02 am, Mike Meredith wrote:
> On Tue, 14 Sep 2004 00:52:13 -0400, Eric Webb wrote:
> > (Work is implementing SAP.  SAP runs on HP-UX machines, but forwards
> > LPR requests to a Win2003 spooler before hitting the end devices -
>
> Who came up with that idea ? Sounds like someone went out of their way
> to make printing less reliable, and printers don't need any help with
> that! The HP-UX machines should be able to send printouts direct to the
> printers.

Well, it wasn't MY idea, let me assure you.  Even the SAP consultants are 
telling the guys to get rid of NT and stick in something Unix.  Yeah, we're 
at these 4 servers (they thought they had to "distribute the load") and we're 
not even halfway done with implementation yet!

The idea, though, was to let SAP dump printing on us.  Our SAP instances are 
hosted outside (not my idea, again) the company.  Shooting print jobs to our 
own intermediate server enables us to control things a little better since we 
can't touch the SAP servers.  Sure, there's no reason it couldn't go directly 
to the printer.  And since they're largely a Wintel shop...

> I'd avoid using the JetDirect "protocol" unless you have something
> that'll do two-way communication and understands PJL. Stick to LPD or
> IPP (but upgrade the firmware).

Interesting.  Any facts to back this up?  Is one slower than the other?  I'm 
printing labels to a bunch of Zebras on JetDirects (under NT4) and I use LPD 
on my stuff and have no problems at all  These guys are using the 9100 stuff 
and so far have had nothing but problems.