Printer Light Blinks and Will Only Print If the Go Button Is Pressed

HP LaserJet 2100 and 2200 Series Printers -

When sending a print job, the attention (red) light on the printer starts blinking and the user has to press the GO button to make the printer print.

In some cases, this behavior may be caused if the manual feed setting on the printer is enabled. Print a configuration page to see if the manual feed option is set to ON. If it is, one of the ways to change this setting is by creating a file with the PJL command to turn off manual feed and sending the file to the printer.

Using the DOS editor to create the PJL command file

Open the MS-DOS? or Command prompt window. Change to the root directory or C: prompt.

In the MS-DOS window, type Edit manfeed.pjl and press ENTER.

A DOS edit screen named manfeed.pjl will open.

Press and release CTRL + P on the keyboard and then press ESC one time.

The Escape (Esc) character, an arrow pointing to the left, should appear. (The Escape character described is for a DOS editor only.)

Immediately after the Escape arrow, type the following (case sensitive):

%-12345X@PJL DEFAULT MANUALFEED=OFF

Press ALT + F and then press S to save the file.

Press ALT + F and then press X to exit the DOS editor and return to the C: prompt. Leave the DOS window open.

Sending the PJL file to the printer

In the DOS window, and with the printer on and ready, type

copy manfeed.pjl lpt1

If the printer uses a different connection than lpt1, replace lpt1 with the correct port or network path.

Print a Self-test/Configuration page to verify that the manual feed setting is off.

The manual feed option has been set to on and as there is no control panel on the printer to turn it off. A PJL command has to be sent to the printer to turn manual feed off.

This procedure is a good option if the printer's CD is not available (which has the DEFAULTS.PJL file on it) or if the user does not want to remove the HP Jetdirect print server to cold reset the printer.

The same procedure can also be used for changing other default settings on the printer using different PJL commands.

© 2005 Hewlett-Packard