Manual duplex printing requires each finished page to be flipped.

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Guest

In Word 2003, using the Manual Duplex printing feature, I get accurate
two-sided printing with one problem: I must flip each sheet of the finished
output as it appears in the output stack. For example, the first sheet in the
stack will have PAGE 2 on SIDE A and PAGE 1 on SIDE B; the second sheet will
have PAGE 4 on SIDE A and PAGE 3 on SIDE B. This means that if you thumbed
through the output stack, you would see pages 2, 4, 6, 8.... in sequence,
rather than the desired pages 1, 3, 5, 7...

For large jobs, flipping each sheet individually is a real nuisance. I
cannot seem to find a sequence of steps and combination of settings that
avoid this problem. Any advice?
 
This sounds like a printer problem and not a Word problem. Word cannot
control the capabilities or limitations of your printer. Check your printer
manual.
 
Try printing in reverse order (or turn it off). Your printer spits out
paper face up, is that right? Reverse order is usually the key that adjusts
for that (Word| Preferences, Print, but sometimes printers also offer an
option in the File Print dialog, and having them both on cancels it out).

Experiment with a short booklet.
 
There are some mysterious duplex-related settings on the Print tab of Tools
| Options that presumably control this. You might also try using "Reverse
print order."

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
I'd have to disagree. This is "manual duplex" so I'm using Word's software to
print the pages in the sequence that Word decides...I only provide the labor
of taking the output out of the printer and reinserting it for the second
pass. The problem is in the sequence of the page images that Word is
outputting.

But thanks for responding nonetheless.
 
I have already tried (nerly countless) permutations of the settings
available, including using reverse order and/or the front/back DUplex
Printing checkboxes on the Options page. So far, none of these combinations
has affected the original problem I described.

I would think that anyone should be able to reproduce this with a Word 2003
and any printer at all.
 
What *is* the sequence of page images that Word is sending to the printer?
In the first pass and the second pass?

I'm not sure exactly what Word 2003 Manual Duplex does, but I assume you
print all the odd pages, then all the even pages. Might printing all the
even pages, then all the odd pages, work? (or vice versa, switch whatever is
currently being done) You might have to add an extra fake page to make sure
the last page is even, though, not sure.
 
Follow-up by original poster:
While I was unable to find a solution to the issue using any combination of
Word's printing settings, I was able to get correct results using a
(one-click) solution provided by the printer's own driver. My HP Color
LaserJet 3700 driver gives its own option for manual duplex printing. When
used with all of Word's settings set to defaults, the output is both correct
AND flipped the right way for reading.

Thank you for your responses.
 
Daiya,

As I said in the original post:
"For example, the first sheet in the stack will have PAGE 2 on SIDE A and
PAGE 1 on SIDE B; the second sheet will have PAGE 4 on SIDE A and PAGE 3 on
SIDE B. This means that if you thumbed through the output stack, you would
see pages 2, 4, 6, 8.... in sequence, rather than the desired pages 1, 3, 5,
7...

The pages come out in the hopper face down, and go back in face down so that
the reverse side is printed.

I think the problem is that the Word routine is printing the odd sides
first, and then the even sides. This leaves you with page 2 on the top of
the stack.

I've tried using the Reverse flag, and although it should have corrected the
problem, it did not.

If I do this all semi-manually (printing just the odd pages and then just
the even pages) I can get it right, but my aim was to use Microsoft's "Manual
Duplex" feature to save some effort....but to no avail.
 
Did you in fact experiment with the "Options for duplex printing" on the
Print tab of Tools | Options? There are two check boxes for "Front of sheet"
(with a picture showing pages 1, 3, 5) and "Back of sheet" (showing 2, 4,
6). Do these check boxes influence which page is printed first?

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
Elsewhere he says face down.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
No matter, you've said you've got it fixed now with the one-click printer
setting solution, right?

Daiya
 
They affect the order of the pages (1,3,5 vs 5,3,1) but the do _not_ affect
the problem, which is that the odd pages print first, and the even pages
print second. This means that regardless of page number sequence, the end
product has page 2 at the top of the stack rather than page 1 (which is
facing down); and the next sheet in the stack has page 4 on its front side
and page 3 on its reverse.
 
Suzanne and Daiya,

I think that I've finally hit the combination that gets me the right result,
and I'm sorry it took me so long. (Too many possible permutations available.)

If I set BOTH of the "Options for Duplex Printing" to use reverse order, and
_DO NOT_ invoke the reverse printing option, and _DO_ use the Manual Duplex
option....then it comes out correctly.

In retrospect, this should have all been very obvious.

Thanks for your interest and responses.

-Larry
 
Thanks for the feedback. Since I duplex entirely manually, I've never even
tried to figure out these options!

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
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