The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #152914   Message #3579700
Posted By: JohnInKansas
28-Nov-13 - 03:03 PM
Thread Name: Tech: Need advice on Printer
Subject: RE: Tech: Need advice on Printer
If you're using a printer (like your 730WD) that prints one side, turns the sheet over and prints the other side, you should be able to make your document so that all the pages are right side up when viewed in your wp program, and print them so they're all the same side up or bottom-to-top when you turn the pages.

When you click print, and select your printer, you should be able to set "print 2-sided." When you click to print 2-sided here should be a "Properties" or "Options" (and/or Densities) button. There may also be a set of "Presets" that can be edited, but clicking one of those doesn't do anything unless you've defined what that one is supposed to do previously. For my Epson WF7520, when the printer selected first comes up, the needed adjustments are at a "Properties" button. When I put a check mark at "2-sided printing" in the Properties, a button for "Settings" and a separate button for "Print densites" appear. There is a pop up warning that for printing documents with lots of images the Densities settings are important, but when I close that popup, the Settings button comes back.

In "Settings" there should be a "Binding Edge" where you can choose Left or Top. If you choose "Top" your printer should print the odd pages right side up and the even pages upside down, so that when you "turn the page up" in the printed document both pages are right way up for reading. If you select binding edge "Left" both sides should print the same side up, so that when you "turn a page left" in the printed document they're correct for reading. This means you don't need to change your file (in my case Word.doc) in order to print the same "book" single sided or 2-sided, as a book or as a flip-chart.

A help file for your printer should give specific instructions if you look for "binding edge" but since your printer and mine are both Epsons they should be similar to what I've described. I found better instructions in Word Help than in the Printer help, but YMMV.

My "Help" file in Word gives instructions similar to the above for a few different printers (as offsite help), and while the ones I looked at are all similar there are some deviations. As you observed, if I click 2-sided printing on the "Main" tab of the printer Preferences, it allows me to create "preferences" to save the settings for a new way of printing, but the settings themselves have to be entered by putting a check in a separate "2-sided printing" box. When I check the 2-sided printing box, I get separate buttons for the "Print Density" and for "Settings." The Settings button is where the binding edge can be changed for my priinter. Your choices may be labelled differently, and/or your printer may not have all of the same options available.

John