QUESTION pagecounts

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 09:42:35 UTC, Arthur Entlich
<e-printerhelp@mvps.org> wrote:

> I'd call this "extreme backpedaling" to go with the your extreme ironing.

Your lack of comprehension is astounding. I give up.

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 12:37:55 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> > Your lack of comprehension is astounding. I give up.
>
> His comprehension is perfectly fine. You see someone like me who
> doesn't actually know the button presses to the LJ 4 reading ""Not true
> on the average laser printer; it's supposed to be non-resettable" and

Note the word "supposed". I know it's resettable, you know it's
resettable, but the user isn't *supposed* to do it. With the number of
bootleg copies of the service manual around, it's common knowledge how
to do it, and it's pointless trying to keep it a secret!

> "that is done if the engineer changes the board with the counter NVRAM
> on it" is going to assume you mean a difficult task, like yanking off
> the NVRAM chip

No, just that if the engineer does a board change, the number in the new
board is set to that in the old one. A simple task.

> I wonder though if a board is bad or if a printer is not printing how
> do you get these numbers to transfer to a new board without extracting
> the NVRAM chip, and if you can extract it and it's good why not just
> use it in the new board rather than deal with manual entry.

Well, of course, you can't. But the user usually has a good
approximation to the number. I always record the count when I change the
toner cartridge, for example.

I don't know offhand what kind of NVRAM the formatter board uses (I can
go and look at a spare board if you want to know). But I've seen 12 year
old printers that have never had that board replaced or serviced; I
suspect that any battery change is supposed to mean an exchange board.

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 14:16:32 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> > I don't know offhand what kind of NVRAM the formatter board uses (I can
> > go and look at a spare board if you want to know). But I've seen 12 year
> > old printers that have never had that board replaced or serviced; I
> > suspect that any battery change is supposed to mean an exchange board.
>
> I honestly don't know if the LJ 4 has their NVRAM chip soldered on or
> not. The batteries on them are not officaly end user replaceable..
> they are embeaded somewhere between the dram and a hard plastic shell.

I'm come across those elsewhere - sometimes with a clock chip too (the
DS12887 is a case in point; used on some IBM PS/2 models).

> While I
> don't know the particulars of the LJ 4 nor what type of NVRAM is
> used... in general the useful lifespan is 10 to 20 years.

I've found 12887s tend to fail after about 10 years, but it's certainly
in that ball park for most of them, I guess.

> Unless there are other forms of NV that
> i'm not aware of... it's just ram with a battery backup that becomes
> just as volitile as ordinary ram when the supply of power gives out.

The Apple LaserWriter II/IINT used an EEPROM - no battery needed. The
downside was that it wore out after a few thousand writes, so was used
only for rarely-changed information - not pagecounts!

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[zakezuke]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

> No, I'm sure it was store dsomwhere. It just wasn't in the EEPROM that
> contained the user configuration. I'm quoting from the user manual when
> I say that it was EEPROM and had a limited life. There were even special
> PostScript programs that avoided updating it if the value was the same
> already - to save a 'cycle'.

> Possibly the LW II used an NVRAM chip with only a few bytes of storage,
> hence the EEPROM. Dunno.

Well, the page count was non-volitile... plus the fact that appletalk
was an option on the LW II, a feature that I would be surprised wasn't
on the system board. While I didn't "say" the LW II used an NV ram,
and I might have incorrectly assumed the LW II stored it's page count
on the system board... i'm going to take a leap of faith here and say
when the LW II did it's AARP probe and found a successful address... it
stored it somewhere, somewhere in non-volitile memory on the system
board as appletalk was a feature somewhat unique to the apple printers
on the canon sx engine. This could be NVRAM or some form of externaly
battery backed up ram. Appletalk devices typicaly used NVRAM. I don't
have a board handy to see if there was a battery, so i'd be curious to
know what was used to store nonvolitle data that was likely to change.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 14:36:10 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> > Higher degree - do you mean a Master's degree?
>
> Higher than high-school, hince the name higher degree. Generally
> speaking people mean BA or above when saying higher degree.

Not in the UK, in my experience. There's 'degree' (BA, BSc, BEng) and
there's 'higher degree' (MSc, MA, MEng, Ph.D, DPhil). But then I'm
probably picky because I'm in the education area! So, just mentioned for
interest!

> Generally speaking engineers design and build... technicians and
> mechanics repair and maintain.

I wholeheartedly agree. Unfortunately the word is often used for
'technician' (e.g. by HP themselves) and I used that definition (I
should not have). The term 'engineer' is much misused, and real
engineers do not enjoy the status that they should.

(I speak as a qualified engineer!)

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[zakezuke]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

additional... what gets reset when you flip dipswitch 1 if not either
battery backed up ram or nvram.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 15:03:11 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> > I'm come across those elsewhere - sometimes with a clock chip too (the
> > DS12887 is a case in point; used on some IBM PS/2 models).
>
> Could be... can't say I ever remember seeing a traditional battery on a
> PS/2. Can't think of why you'd need one really except for the clock...
> unless the data for MCA cards was stored on the NVRAM and not the HD.

The NVRAM was for the clock (year digits) and also for the MCA
configuration data. Stored in NVRAM in all but the later models (in fact
I think it was in NVRAM even then).

> cards. IBM at one point had all this data on FTP... but as they
> ditched lifetime free tech support I imagine they probally ditched this
> data as well.

It's all still on FTP, but without an index. There are plenrty of
mirrors though.

> Or you could be telling me that the page count on the LW NT was not
> stored on the system board, in which case I guess i'm a dumb ass for
> even thinking I lost that information when I changed system boards.

No, I'm sure it was store dsomwhere. It just wasn't in the EEPROM that
contained the user configuration. I'm quoting from the user manual when
I say that it was EEPROM and had a limited life. There were even special
PostScript programs that avoided updating it if the value was the same
already - to save a 'cycle'.

Possibly the LW II used an NVRAM chip with only a few bytes of storage,
hence the EEPROM. Dunno.
--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[zakezuke]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

>Dunno...it's years since I had the Apple LW!

You seemed very clear on the subject when you said

"The Apple LaserWriter II/IINT used an EEPROM - no battery needed. The
downside was that it wore out after a few thousand writes, so was used
only for rarely-changed information - not pagecounts!"

An odd thing to say when you replied to my concern over swapping boards
in an LW NT about the pagecount. It did clearly employ a form of
non-volitile memory. The LJ II used NVRAM to store info like
pagecounts. It could be this data was stored as part of the Canon SX
engine seperate from the system board. But that doesn't take into
account data as part of the appletalk protocal, which typicaly used
NVram. I'd wager a battery was required, but a service manual which
tends to speak to the lowest common denominator, if it said "no battery
is required" might mean "no external battery replacement is nessicary
as the lifespand on the NVram is 10+ years".

But since you have a manual... I would suspect that if you would look
up the fuction of dipswitch one it would tell you want it resets.

I'm not going to say what the LW NT used because I don't have any idea.
I know it kept track of pagecounts and being appletalk stored the last
useable address two things that would be annoying to put in an EEprom.
There was also trivial little things like baud rate for the serial
ports, printer name, basic printer settings which were not changed all
that offen that could have been stored in an EEprom I imagine... but
really it's a total mystery to me why being up EEproms when talking
about pagecounts. Seems odd and I have no idea what your point was.

 

[Alan]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On 13 Aug 2005 18:31:56 GMT, "Bob Eager" <rde42@spamcop.net> wrote:

>On Sat, 13 Aug 2005 17:38:39 UTC, Alan <none@none.com> wrote:
>
>> >For example, on the LaserJet 4 it can be reset by an engineer - and that
>> >is done if the engineer changes the board with the counter NVRAM on it.
>> >He is supposed to set the new board to have the same count as the old
>> >one.
>>
>> On an HP4 or 5 at least, you can set the pagecount to be anything you
>> want from the front panel if you know the magic combination

>Isn't that what I said? (without giving details)?

Well "it can be reset by an engineer" gives the distinct impression of
specialised knowledge, a higher degree and tools being necessary, not
just pressing several keys on the control panel.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 14:02:47 UTC, Alan <none@none.com> wrote:

> >> >For example, on the LaserJet 4 it can be reset by an engineer - and that
> >> >is done if the engineer changes the board with the counter NVRAM on it.
> >> >He is supposed to set the new board to have the same count as the old
> >> >one.
> >>
> >> On an HP4 or 5 at least, you can set the pagecount to be anything you
> >> want from the front panel if you know the magic combination
>
> >Isn't that what I said? (without giving details)?
>
> Well "it can be reset by an engineer" gives the distinct impression of
> specialised knowledge, a higher degree and tools being necessary, not
> just pressing several keys on the control panel.

Specialised knowledge == service manual !!
Higher degree - do you mean a Master's degree?

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 22:08:23 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> additional... what gets reset when you flip dipswitch 1 if not either
> battery backed up ram or nvram.

Dunno...it's years since I had the Apple LW!

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 21:53:31 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> Well, the page count was non-volitile... plus the fact that appletalk
> was an option on the LW II, a feature that I would be surprised wasn't
> on the system board. While I didn't "say" the LW II used an NV ram,
> and I might have incorrectly assumed the LW II stored it's page count
> on the system board... i'm going to take a leap of faith here and say
> when the LW II did it's AARP probe and found a successful address... it
> stored it somewhere, somewhere in non-volitile memory on the system
> board as appletalk was a feature somewhat unique to the apple printers
> on the canon sx engine. This could be NVRAM or some form of externaly
> battery backed up ram. Appletalk devices typicaly used NVRAM. I don't
> have a board handy to see if there was a battery, so i'd be curious to
> know what was used to store nonvolitle data that was likely to change.

So would I.

Meanwhile, I did find a copy of the IInt manual. Here's an extract (from
page 41):

"Note: Because the LaserWriter IInt component that registers the options
can wear out with excessive use (several thousand changes), change the
options only when necessary."

Nothing about NVRAM but I'm sure there must have been something else.
Note that this is on the IInt; the IIntx didn't have the EEPROM
(probably it was straight battery backed NVRAM) because the manual says
that it didn't have the same restriction.

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[zakezuke]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

> >But with respect to page counters.....several older and/or low end monochrome
> >laser printers don't have a counter.

> Really? My HP IIp had one as does the IIIp that now sits in a corner in
> case of emergencies.

I have to admit, I can't think of a single laser printer that didn't
have a counter somewhere. I have seen some trully oddball ones that
had a manual counter somewhere inside, but these were very very odd
beasts back when the HP LJ was young. The HP II series while popular
were not really the first by any means. The oldest laser I know of was
the LBP-10 and that is by name only. There were some earlier 70s
versions by xerox, but I know nothing at all about those, far too big
and heavy to store on my desk.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

On Mon, 15 Aug 2005 00:02:03 UTC, "zakezuke" <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com>
wrote:

> >Dunno...it's years since I had the Apple LW!
>
> You seemed very clear on the subject when you said
>
> "The Apple LaserWriter II/IINT used an EEPROM - no battery needed. The
> downside was that it wore out after a few thousand writes, so was used
> only for rarely-changed information - not pagecounts!"
>
> An odd thing to say when you replied to my concern over swapping boards
> in an LW NT about the pagecount. It did clearly employ a form of
> non-volitile memory.

No, I was merely saying that it appeared to have *both*.

--
Bob Eager
begin a new life...take up Extreme Ironing!

 

[ME]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

In message <part1of1.1.baJ7j4CC1h8AXA@ue.ph>, Tony <?@?.?.invalid>
writes
>But with respect to page counters.....several older and/or low end monochrome
>laser printers don't have a counter.

Really? My HP IIp had one as does the IIIp that now sits in a corner in
case of emergencies.

--
Timothy

 

[Tony]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

"me@privacy.net" <me@Privacy.Net> wrote:
>In message <part1of1.1.baJ7j4CC1h8AXA@ue.ph>, Tony <?@?.?.invalid>
>writes
>>But with respect to page counters.....several older and/or low end monochrome
>>laser printers don't have a counter.
>
>Really? My HP IIp had one as does the IIIp that now sits in a corner in
>case of emergencies.
>
>--
>Timothy

Timothy
Yes really.... several older OKI and Brother lasers do not count pages. So far
as I know all modern lasers do keep count.
Tony

 

[Tony]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

"me@privacy.net" <me@Privacy.Net> wrote:
>In message <part1of1.1.baJ7j4CC1h8AXA@ue.ph>, Tony <?@?.?.invalid>
>writes
>>But with respect to page counters.....several older and/or low end monochrome
>>laser printers don't have a counter.
>
>Really? My HP IIp had one as does the IIIp that now sits in a corner in
>case of emergencies.
>
>--
>Timothy

Timothy
Oh by the way...I'd forgotten these.
HP LaserJet 4L,5L and 6L printers don't have any NVRAM available, so there is
no way for the printer to retain a page count once the printer is powered off.
These printers have a page counter that operates until the printer is powered
off. At power off the page count is reset to zero.
I guess you could argue that they do count pages but they suffer from medium
and long term memory loss <g>.
Yep, old printers but still around.
Tony

 

[ME]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

In message <1124095266.251723.207710@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,
zakezuke <zakezuke_us@yahoo.com> writes
>> >But with respect to page counters.....several older and/or low end
>> >monochrome
>> >laser printers don't have a counter.
>
>> Really? My HP IIp had one as does the IIIp that now sits in a corner in
>> case of emergencies.
>
>I have to admit, I can't think of a single laser printer that didn't
>have a counter somewhere. I have seen some trully oddball ones that
>had a manual counter somewhere inside,

Strangely enough my colour photocopier/printer has both manual ones and
the system board ones. My black and white photocopier has a manual
counter only.


--
Timothy

 

[zakezuke]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

> "Note: Because the LaserWriter IInt component that registers the options
> can wear out with excessive use (several thousand changes), change the
> options only when necessary."
>
> Nothing about NVRAM but I'm sure there must have been something else.
> Note that this is on the IInt; the IIntx didn't have the EEPROM
> (probably it was straight battery backed NVRAM) because the manual says
> that it didn't have the same restriction.

Righto... when I swapped out my system board in my laser printer (note
the generic because the particulars are beside the point)... there was
no way for me to know the page count because the system board was
kaput, and while it normally would tell me the page when I turned on
the printer... I turned that feature off. When I finally gave away
that printer, I had to say in all honesty I had no idea what the page
count was as I swapped out the system boards.

I could be incorrect in thinking that info was stored on the system
board, or I could be correct. It's generally a safe assumption on most
lasers. The mechnism that stores the information is beside the point
when in the case of a systemboard failure there is no real means of
telling what the page count is. If your lucky there is a log
somewhere that'll give you a ball park figure.. but generally speaking
unless the printer had any sort of service... that information is lost.

Anyhow there are rebuilt lasers who have a pagecount of zero. Perhaps
this was set to keep track of the new referbished pagecount, or perhaps
they replaced the system board and had no clue what the page count
was... very likely in the PC recycling world where you don't meet the
prior owners it's just surplus. While this may be contrary to the
written world of the service manual... reality is contrary to the
written word of the service manual as there is really no way to know
the page count on a system board that is fried. If using NVram or some
form of flashrom you "might" be able to pull it and put it in the new
one.... if your lucky, but in a real world situation it's perfectly
normal for that data to be gone.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

Oh really?

I think the feeling is mutual.

Art

Bob Eager wrote:

> On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 09:42:35 UTC, Arthur Entlich
> <e-printerhelp@mvps.org> wrote:
>
>
>>I'd call this "extreme backpedaling" to go with the your extreme ironing.
>
>
> Your lack of comprehension is astounding. I give up.
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.periphs.printers (More info?)

You keep digging yourself further into your own hole.

Here and in a previous posting you admit how accessible the service
manual is; well out of the secret cloisters of HP and their official
techs, obviously making the reset procedure VERY accessible to the
general public, and therefore NO engineer is required, nor is there any
need for a board change or an internal reprogramming of the non-volatile
RAM.

THEREFORE, the original statement that the page count numbers being a
potentially unreliable benchmark of the use the printer has received
which you tried to refute with your statement about the need for
engineers and programming knowledge is indeed accurate and your
statement that is was not, is the bogus one, just as I pointed out.

You now seem to be refuting your own postings by stating that it is easy
to change the page count if you have the service manual, and that the
service manual is no longer in the control of HP and the technicians
they wish to have it.

I really don't know how much clearer the logic of my argument could be made.

Art


Bob Eager wrote:

> On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 14:02:47 UTC, Alan <none@none.com> wrote:
>
>
>>>>>For example, on the LaserJet 4 it can be reset by an engineer - and that
>>>>>is done if the engineer changes the board with the counter NVRAM on it.
>>>>>He is supposed to set the new board to have the same count as the old
>>>>>one.
>>>>
>>>>On an HP4 or 5 at least, you can set the pagecount to be anything you
>>>>want from the front panel if you know the magic combination
>>
>>>Isn't that what I said? (without giving details)?
>>
>>Well "it can be reset by an engineer" gives the distinct impression of
>>specialised knowledge, a higher degree and tools being necessary, not
>>just pressing several keys on the control panel.
>
>
> Specialised knowledge == service manual !!
> Higher degree - do you mean a Master's degree?
>