Printing envelopes with Minolta PagePro 1250W

[Alan]

When I print an envelope, 6 3/4", on my Minolta PagePro 1250W laser printer, envelope width-wise & top first, the printing is shifted as if the program thinks the envelope is on the other side, left instead of right, and truncated to where the margin is for the actual fed envelope, right side of printer. I tried swapping sides and had the same result. I have version 1.5.4.7b4 and this is the first time I have printed envelopes with the beta version, and the first time I have printed with smaller envelopes instead of business size. What am I doing wrong?

[admin]

As I understand, you mean the “6 3/4 Envelope, 6 1/2 x 3 5/8 in” format.

Before printing, Atlantis needs to request a paper format from your printer. According to the documentation of your printer, this envelope format is not directly supported by your printer (it is not among the supported paper formats of your printer). So Atlantis requests the nearest bigger paper format supported by your printer. This format is “Monarch Envelope, 7 1/2 x 3 7/8 in”. So your printer assumes that Atlantis will print a “Monarch Envelope”.

The “Tools | Envelopes…” dialog of Atlantis includes various feed methods. They control not only the orientation of envelopes (portrait or landscape). But in cases like yours (when the required envelope format is smaller than the closest paper format supported by your printer) you can specify how Atlantis should align the envelope data (left-align, center-align, or right-align) within the bigger paper format offered by your printer.

I am not sure that understand which feed method you use, but have you tried choosing a different feed method in the “Tools | Envelopes…” dialog of Atlantis?

Envelopes can be loaded to many printers in multiple different ways. And it is important to choose a proper feed method, especially in case of “nonstandard” envelope formats (I mean nonstandard as for your printer).

[Alan]

You are correct about 6 3/4 envelope.
From the 6 selections for envelope feed I tried the 2 with alignment to the left & right sides of the input tray with the envelope aligned 6 1/2" across the width of the printer, not with the narrow 3 5/8" feeding into the printer. In both cases the printing was shifted over from one side and truncated on the other side at the printer margin for the envelope.

[admin]

Did you mean that in both cases the shift was identical?

Is it possible with your printer to print envelopes aligned across the height of the printer's intray (this corresponds to the 3 bottomost feed methods in Atlantis)?

Could you try printing a Monarch Envelope (it is available among the envelope formats in Atlantis)?

[admin]

The left & right are not exactly the same.

I set the envelope to Monarch and did 2 test cases. First I choose Face down with the upper right box selected, right side envelope feed. The Return address was 1 3/4" from the left, the margin said 0.75, and 3/8" from the top, the margin said 0.39. The Delivery address was 3" from the left, the margin said 2.25, and 1 3/4" from the top, the margin said 1.94. The Delivery address was truncated on the right and ended 2 1/2" from the right side of the envelope.

The second test was Face up with the upper right box selected, right side envelope feed. The Return address was not printed. The left side of the Delivery address was not printed, printing for it started at 2 7/16" from the left side of the envelope, and the top margin was the same as Face down.

[admin]

Thanks for your information.

First, only one value of the "Face up/Face down" option in the "Tools | Envelopes" is correct for your printer. You should choose the proper value only once, and do not toggle it anymore.

Does the manual of your printer say how (smaller) envelopes should be loaded to the intray of your printer? It is very important to follow such instructions from the printer's manual.

Please try inserting a whole piece of paper (A4 or US Letter), and print an envelope in Atlantis. Notice where it prints. Does it correspond to how you are inserting the envelope?

[Alan]

I printed a whole sheet of letter paper with the same results of my last post, the printer does not print outside of where the envelope would be.

[Robert]

I printed a whole sheet of letter paper with the same results of my last post, the printer does not print outside of where the envelope would be.

Greetings–
I am sorry but I don’t quite understand what you mean by the above. When you write “the printer does not print outside of where the envelope would be”, do you mean to say that the printer prints a US Letter sheet of paper exactly where, —and as—, you would expect it to print the 6 3/4 envelope?

If this is the case, I can suggest a quick and dirty solution:

1. Set Atlantis to print a US Letter sheet of paper.
2. Place the 6 3/4 envelope where Atlantis previously printed the text of your envelope on the US Letter sheet of paper.
3. Print the envelope.

The envelope should be printed as expected.

Now here is something else that you might want to check.

Most likely, your printer has a "Printing Preferences" dialog. Does that dialog have an "Effects" tab? If it has, you might find an option to "Print document on". If this is the case, uncheck the "Print document on" box or select the appropriate envelope format. Also make sure that the correct envelope format is selected both in Atlantis and the printer "Printing Preferences" dialog.

Does this help?

Cheers
Robert

[Alan]

What I meant was that the printer was set up the same as before to print on an envelope. Instead of putting an envelope in I put in a sheet of letter paper to see if the printer was printing anywhere else than it would if an envelope were printed.

I will dig up the manual and check out Print Preferences later today.

[Robert]

What I meant was that the printer was set up the same as before to print on an envelope. Instead of putting an envelope in I put in a sheet of letter paper to see if the printer was printing anywhere else than it would if an envelope were printed.

Greetings–
When you put in a sheet of US Letter paper instead of an envelope, and Atlantis and the printer are set to print a 6 3/4 envelope, does the envelope text get printed correctly? That is, would it print as expected if you had inserted an envelope at the appropriate position instead of a sheet of paper?

If so, what is the correct way to feed the envelope?

Does it correspond to the feeding method you chose in Atlantis and the printer options? If not, can you change the feeding method so that the envelope gets printed correctly, even if it does not look like it would?

Cheers
Robert

[Alan]

When I print an envelope with the width across the input tray of the printer, it is not printed correctly, the addresses are incomplete, that is, truncated. This is using a US Letter sheet of paper instead of an envelope.

When printing envelopes with lengthwise feed, all 3 feeds: left, center and right, are centered on the sheet of US Letter paper. The 2 addresses are complete and the Return address starts where it should, 0.75 inches from the left of where the Monarch envelope would be. The Delivery address starts at 3 inches instead of the 2.25 inches shown for the margin.

The printers CD FAQ places an envelope on the left with the flap fold on the left, lengthwise feed.

[Alan]

I just noticed when looking through the sheet of paper I last printed on that the widthwise feed seemed to be truncated at the lengthwise-center feed width margins, 4mm margins for the PagePro 1250W. The text width when truncated is between 3 9/16" and 3 5/8".

[Robert]

Greetings--
Your printer has a "Paper" tab in the "Printing Preferences" dialog.

On the "Paper" tab, you have the following 3 settings:

1. “Original Document Size”
2. “Output Paper Size”
3. “Scaling”

Have you tried specifying 100% for scaling and custom values for both “Original Document Size” and “Output Paper Size”?

If at all possible, both “Original Document Size” and “Output Paper Size” should be set to 6 1/2 x 3 5/8 in.

Have you also tried toggling the “Fit to Paper” option on and off?

Hope this helps.

Cheers
Robert

[Alan]

I have set the originating document size to Monarch and the output size to Monarch with 100% scaling and no fit to paper, that was for all the measurements I have previously given you. I will continue to use those settings for the purpose of troubleshooting this envelope printing.

[Robert]

I have set the originating document size to Monarch and the output size to Monarch with 100% scaling and no fit to paper, that was for all the measurements I have previously given you. I will continue to use those settings for the purpose of troubleshooting this envelope printing.

Greetings--
If you are actually using 6 3/4 envelopes, it might be preferable to set custom values to reflect this.
Whenever I am using unsupported envelope formats with my Canon printer, I cannot print envelopes correctly unless I specify custom values that reflect the actual size of the envelopes used.
Cheers
Robert

[Guest]

Thanks for the advice, when what is going on is figured out I will set up Atlantis that way. In the mean time I will keep the settings on Monarch to make what I do consistent for reporting to you and also I will not print any 6 3/4 envelopes.