by Grant King
One of the most basic uses for a computer is to print out documents. Although as a society we are moving toward the goal of decreasing the amount of paper we generate, in many cases you will still find the need to print material from your computer to preserve it or share it with other people. Whether you need to print letters, graphs, pictures, or other such items, to do this you must install a printer on your computer and understand some of the basics of managing any printers used by your computer. This chapter shows you how to make full use of the printing features found in Windows 98.
The printer settings for your computer are stored in the Printers folder. The
usual way to access the Printers folder is to click on the Start button, select Settings,
and then choose Printers. This opens the Printers folder, as shown in Figure
13.1.
FIG. 13.1 The Printers
folder provides a central place from which to manage all your local and network printers.
Note in this example that the HP LaserJet 5 is a network printer and is also shown
as the default printer. You can also access the Printers folder by any of the following
methods:
The Printers folder contains icons for adding a printer as well as for any printers you have installed on your computer. If you have any other devices or software that use a printer driver, such as a fax modem, an icon representing the printer driver for that device also appears in this folder.
While you may have more than one printer installed on your computer, only one of these printers can be defined as your default printer, although you can change this default setting at any time. When a printer is set as the default printer, it is the printer that is automatically selected each time you print a document.
You can easily tell which printer is set as the default by looking at the printer icons found within the Printers folder. As you saw in Figure 13.1, the default printer has a check mark in the upper-left portion of its icon.
When you install the first printer on your computer, it is automatically installed as the default printer. Unless you change the default setting, the first printer you install on your computer remains as the default, even if you later add additional printers to the Printers folder.
If you want to select a different printer as the default, right-click on that printer's icon in the Printer Folder and choose Set as Default. The check mark moves to the selected printer's icon, and that printer is now set as the default printer.
A printer's properties are the detailed settings for that particular printer. These properties are contained in the Properties page for each printer. You can access a printer's Properties page by either of the following methods from within the Printers folder:
Because the Properties page for a printer is directly related to the functions
exposed through the printer's driver, the Properties page looks somewhat different
from printer to printer. Thus, the Properties page for your printer might appear
differently than that shown in Figure 13.2.
FIG. 13.2 The Properties
page for a printer contains multiple tabs, each containing various options you can
set for that printer.
For installation purposes, Windows 98 distinguishes between local and network printers. A local printer is one that is physically connected to your computer via a cable, whereas a network computer is physically attached to another computer but is available for use by your computer through your network connection.
Before you attempt to set up a local printer on your computer, you first need to make sure that you can connect to that printer from your computer. Some of the things you need to check are
In an effort to make it easier for you to install printers and other hardware on your computer, Microsoft has worked with hardware manufacturers to develop the Plug and Play standard. Through the use of Plug and Play support, Windows 98 can automatically detect hardware attached to your computer and install the appropriate drivers without any intervention on your part.
Assuming that your printer is Plug and Play-compliant, installing your printer is as easy as turning on your attached printer and booting into Windows 98. Plug and Play can install your printer either during the Windows 98 installation process or at any time thereafter when you want to add a printer.
In either event, when Windows 98 loads, it should automatically detect that the printer has been added to your computer. It then brings up a dialog box that informs you of this fact. After Windows 98 has identified the printer, it attempts to install the correct driver for that printer. At this point, it might prompt you to insert the Windows 98 CD-ROM. After you have done that, it looks for that driver on that disk. If the driver did not come with Windows 98 or if you have an updated driver that you want to install instead, simply insert the driver disk from your hardware manufacturer into a disk drive and direct Windows 98 to that drive.
In order for this process to work properly, you have to make sure that the printer you want to add complies with the Plug and Play standard. If you are purchasing the printer in a store, look for the "Designed for Windows 98" logo on the printer box. If the box bears this logo, this indicates that the printer has undergone hardware compatibility testing to make sure that it is fully compatible with Windows 98, including Plug and Play. Because Plug and Play was also supported in Windows 95, the printer should also be fully compatible with Windows 98 if the logo indicates that the printer was designed for Windows 95.
If your printer is an older model or if it came packaged with your computer, you might not be able to tell whether it supports Plug and Play. If Windows 98 does not automatically recognize your printer, you need to manually add it to your computer configuration through the Add Printer Wizard.
If your printer does not support Plug and Play, you can manually install the printer on your computer through the use of the Add Printer Wizard. Open the Printers folder and double-click on the Add Printer icon. After the Add Printer Wizard window appears, click on the Next button to begin using the wizard.
Select the radio button for Local Printer and click the Next button (see Figure
13.3). You are then asked to choose the manufacturer and printer model for
your printer. First select the manufacturer by scrolling down to the name (or abbreviation)
for your printer's manufacturer in the left window of this page of the wizard. Select
that name by clicking on it, and a list of all available printers from that manufacturer
appears in the right window. Select your printer's model by clicking on its name
in the right window.
FIG. 13.3 The Add Printer
Wizard walks you through the steps needed to set up a printer on your computer.
TIP When the Add Printer Wizard prompts you to choose a printer manufacturer and model, you can quickly skip to your hardware manufacturer's printer listings by pressing the first letter of the manufacturer's name. Thus, if you press the letter E, the list scrolls down and selects Epson, thereby automatically opening the available printer selections for Epson printers from which you can choose.
Unless your printer is a very recent model, it is very likely that Windows 98 already has a driver for your printer. In fact, Windows 98 includes drivers for over 1,000 different printers. However, if your printer does not appear to be among the printers listed, you need to click on the Have Disk button and insert a disk containing your printer's drivers into the floppy disk or CD-ROM drive. These drivers should have been supplied to you on disk when you bought your computer. After you indicate the drive on which Windows 98 should look, it then reads the disk you have inserted and lists any available printer drivers found on that disk. Note that the driver might be in a subdirectory on the disk, so you should check the documentation that came with your printer if you are unable to locate the driver. In the event that you are still unable to locate the driver, you need to contact the printer's manufacturer to obtain a Windows 98 driver for your printer (a Windows 95 driver should also work).
After you have selected the correct manufacturer and printer model for your printer,
click on the Next button. You are then asked to choose the port on which you want
to install the printer (see Figure 13.4). This is the hardware port to which you
have attached the printer to your computer. In most cases, the correct port is LPT1,
although you might need to check with your computer's manufacturer or the documentation
that came with your computer to determine which port you should select.
FIG. 13.4 To install the
printer correctly, you need to select the port to which your printer is attached.
As part of the process of selecting a port, you can also configure the port, such
as by having Windows 98 check the status of the port each time before it prints.
If you want to change these settings, click on the Configure Port button found
on this page of the Add Printer Wizard.
After selecting a port for your printer, you are then asked to choose a name for
the printer (see Figure 13.5). In most cases, the default, which is usually the brand
and model number, will suffice. However, if you plan to share this computer with
other people on a network, you might want a more descriptive name, such as "7th
Floor Laser Printer."
FIG. 13.5 You need to
provide a name for your printer that distinguishes it from other printers on your
computer or the network.
You then come to the last page of the Add Printer Wizard, where you are asked if
you want to print a test page. Microsoft recommends that you print a test page when
you install a printer. If you have not installed this printer on your computer before,
this is a good opportunity to make sure that everything is working correctly. Simply
choose the Yes radio button, which is selected by default, and a test page prints
as soon as your printer has been installed.
After you click on the Finish button, Windows 98 installs and configures the printer for use on your computer. Unless the drivers for this printer have previously been added to your computer, such as if you previously installed this type of printer, a dialog box appears asking you to insert the Windows 98 CD-ROM. After you put the CD-ROM into the drive and click on the OK button, the printer driver and any other necessary files are copied to your computer. After this process has ended, an icon for your printer appears in the Printers folder. If this is the only printer installed on your computer, it is automatically selected as the default printer.
If you made it through all of these steps without incident, you are finished. Congratulations! You have just successfully installed your printer in Windows 98. If you need to install a network printer, you will find that the steps needed to make that installation are virtually the same as installing a local printer.
Setting up a network printer in Windows 98 can be as easy as connecting to a local printer, thanks in part to Microsoft's Point and Print process. This process usually allows you to automatically install the correct network printer driver without having to have the Windows 98 CD-ROM or other disk containing the printer driver. Through Point and Print, when you use the Add Printer Wizard to add a network printer, Windows 98 is often able to download the printer driver from the computer or server to which the printer is attached.
Before attempting to set up a network printer on your computer, you first need to know how to connect to the printer. Some of the information you need to know is
To install a network printer on your computer, you first need to be connected to the network. If you have not already established a network connection with your computer, refer to Chapter 37, "Sharing Network Resources," before attempting to connect to and install a network printer. You might also need to check with your network administrator to make sure that you have been given permission to access that printer, because the printer may refuse your connection if you do not have permission.
While being connected to your network, open the Printers folder and double-click on the Add Printer icon. The Add Printer Wizard then appears. Select the radio button for Network Printer and click the Next button.
You are then asked to supply the location of the printer on the network. If you
already know the name of the printer and its attached computer on the network, you
can simply type it into the field on this screen, as shown in Figure 13.6. Note that
you need to supply the UNC (Universal Naming Convention) path for the location of
the printer, such as \\computername\printername where computername
is the name of the computer to which the printer is attached, and printername
is the name of the printer. Thus, in Figure 13.6, Main is the name of the computer
on the network to which the printer hp5 is attached.
FIG. 13.6 You need to
tell the Add Printer Wizard the location of the computer that you want to install
on the network.
If you are not sure of the exact name of the computer and printer on the network,
click on the Browse button. This brings up a separate window (see Figure 13.7)
that lists all other computers on the network that have shared printers.
FIG. 13.7 The Browse window
allows you to select from all available shared printers on the network.
Click on the plus sign to the left of any computer listed in this window to expand
the view to show all shared printers attached to that computer. Click on the OK button
after you have selected the printer you want to add.
NOTE You can choose to install only a single printer each time you run the Add Printer Wizard. If you want to install more than one printer on your computer, you have to add them one at a time. After you have added the first printer, you can then add additional printers one by one. This applies to both local and network printers.
Before you move on to the next window in the Add Printer Wizard, be sure to check the correct radio button indicating if you want to print from MS-DOS-based programs. If you select yes and click on the Next button, the next window of the wizard requests that you capture a printer port for these MS-DOS programs. Even though this shared network printer is not physically attached to your computer, MS-DOS programs often need to believe that they are printing to a local port. By choosing a port to capture for this purpose, when MS-DOS programs attempt to print to this port, Windows 98 redirects the print job to the network printer automatically.
As with local printers, the Add Printer Wizard asks you if you want to print a test page. Select the Yes radio button if you want to see if your connection to the network printer is working properly. After you have decided if you want to print a test page, press the Finish button to install the printer on your computer.
After you have selected the network printer you want to install and have finished with the Add Printer Wizard, Windows 98 then connects to that printer to determine its exact type. After it has determined the make and model of the printer, Windows 98 then sees if you already have a correct version of that printer's driver available on your computer. If you do, the printer should install correctly, and you will be done adding this printer to your Printers folder. In most cases, however, Windows 98 either downloads the correct driver to your computer or you are prompted to insert a disk containing the driver into one of your disk drives.
To address both of these situations, we begin by looking at what happens when Windows 98 is able to download the printer driver to your computer.
TIP Although you can use the Add Printer Wizard to add a printer to your computer, an easier way is to open Network Neighborhood and browse for the printer (you will probably first have to double-click on the icon for the computer to which the printer is attached). After you have found the printer, right-click on the printer's icon and choose Install. This opens the Add Printer Wizard but skips several windows, thus making it easier and quicker to add a network printer.
After you have finished using the Add Printer Wizard, Windows 98 attempts to install the printer driver from the computer to which the printer is attached (if applicable). In many cases, if the shared printer is set up correctly on the computer to which it is attached, Windows 98 can download the printer driver from that computer and install it on your computer. This feature is known as Point and Print.
Assuming that this process works correctly on your computer, you should see a dialog box telling you that Windows 98 has found the proper driver on the remote computer and is installing the driver on your computer. After this has finished, you can connect to and use that printer.
In order for the Point and Print feature to work properly, the computer to which the shared printer is attached must be running Windows 98, Windows NT Server, or be a Novell NetWare server. Note, however, that this feature does not always work properly, and as such you may still have to install the printer driver from either the Windows 98 CD-ROM or the printer driver disk supplied by your printer manufacturer.
If you are unable to install the driver for your printer through the Point and Print feature described in the previous section, you will need to use the Windows 98 CD-ROM or another disk with the appropriate driver in order to provide Windows 98 with the printer driver. After Windows 98 installs the printer driver, an icon for the printer appears in your Printers folder.
After you have installed one or more printers on your computer, you then can print from within any application. In Windows 98, when you print from a Windows application, you can change a number of the printer's configurations within the application itself for the print job you are processing. Windows 98 also includes a print spooler that allows you to get back to work while the operating system processes the print job in the background.
In most Windows applications, you can print the document you are working on by pressing a toolbar button or by selecting Print from the File pull-down menu. After you tell the application to print the document, you likely are presented with a window that allows you to change any needed settings for that print job. Note that although you don't always see this window when you choose a Print button on a toolbar, you should usually see a Print window if you use the pull-down menu.
Figure 13.8 shows the Print window as it appears in the WordPad application that
comes with Windows 98. This window shows the relevant information on the selected
printer, such as the printer's name and its current status. If you want to change
from the default printer to a different printer, just choose the other printer that
you want from the drop-down box next to Name. Instead of printing the entire
document, you can also choose to select only one or more pages for printing by entering
that information into the Print range frame.
FIG. 13.8 When printing from
within applications, you can change your printer settings to best match the needs
of your print job.
If you click the Properties button, a separate window appears that contains much
of the same properties settings available for this printer in the Printers folder.
From this window, you can set the printer resolution, change the paper size, alter
the way the document is printed (such as from portrait to landscape), and other properties
settings. After you have made any wanted changes to the printer settings, click on
the OK button to return to the main Print window and print the document.
Note that the Print window includes an option to print to a file rather than to the selected printer. If you choose this option by selecting the Print to File check box, this does not save the file as a text file, but rather saves the printer output into a data file as opposed to sending it to the printer right away. Unless you want to save this raw printer data for some reason, you probably do not want to use this Print to File feature. If you want to save the file rather than print it, you should choose either Save or Save As from the File pull-down menu.
Windows 98 includes a 32-bit print spooler that supports preemptive multithreading and multitasking, thereby allowing you to get back to work more quickly after you initiate a print job. Before print spoolers were incorporated into the operating system, when you printed a document in an application, you often had to wait until the entire document had been printed before you could return to work in that application. However, with Windows 98, when you tell an application to print a document, the print spooler takes over and accepts the print job in place of the actual printing device to which you have directed the document.
Thus, the print spooler effectively acts as a middleman that receives the print job on behalf of the printer and temporarily stores it on your hard disk. After the application has finished sending either part or all of the print job to the spooler (depending on what print spooler options you have chosen for your printer), the application is then freed up to continue with other work, and the print spooler begins feeding the print job data to the printer in the background.
By default, the print spooler begins feeding print data to the printer after it has received the first page of data from the application. However, if you want to return control to the application more quickly, you can adjust the print spooler properties so that it does not begin printing until the entire document has been received by the spooler. To change these and other print spooler settings, you need to reconfigure the properties for each printer on which you want to make these changes. To do this, right-click on the printer's icon in the Printers folder and choose Properties. Then select the Details tab and choose the Spool Settings button.
In this window (see Figure 13.9), you can change the default settings by instructing
Windows 98 to wait until the last page is spooled before sending the document to
the printer. This shortens the time it takes to return control back to the application
that is printing the document. Alternatively, if you are having printing problems
and want to see if the print spooler is causing the problem, select the related radio
button to have all applications print directly to the printer. However, choosing
this option will probably prevent you from working in the application until the printer
has finished printing the document.
FIG. 13.9 You can change
the Spool Settings for the print spooler on a printer if you want to return control
to an application more quickly or if you need to troubleshoot printing problems.
In this same window, you also see that you can choose between the EMF (enhanced
metafile printing) and RAW spool data formats. Normally you want to use the default
setting for your printer to help ensure error-free printing. EMF usually returns
control back to the application more quickly than using the RAW data format because
the latter must be generated by the printer driver. If the default for your printer
is RAW, try using EMF to speed up the printing process in your application. However,
because some applications do not support EMF, if you experience problems, you should
switch back to the RAW format.
After a print job has been sent to the spooler, a printer icon appears in the system tray indicating that Windows 98 is processing the print job. If you click on this icon, a window opens for that printer from which you can get additional information about the status of the print job. For more information about managing print jobs through this printer window, see the next section.
Through the process of sending documents to your local or network printer, instances will arise when you need to cancel a print job or simply find out what other documents are waiting to be printed. If you want to view the status of a printer, you can open the printer window for that device. If you are in the process of printing a document from your computer, you can click on the printer icon in the system tray to bring up the window for that printer. You can also open that printer's window by double-clicking on its icon in the Printers folder. Note that while the former method might display only print jobs created by your computer, the latter method should display all pending print jobs, including those from any other users on your network.
When you open a printer window, all of the documents currently pending for that printer are displayed (see Figure 13.10). The pending print jobs are shown in their order in the print queue. The print job at the top of the print queue is the document currently being printed. Any documents below that are printed in descending order.
By right-clicking on any of your pending print jobs, you can choose to either
pause or cancel that job. When you pause a print job, it is skipped over when its
place in the queue comes up. While you can exercise control over your own documents,
usually you cannot pause or cancel other people's print jobs unless you have administrative
privileges on that printer.
FIG. 13.10 The printer window
shows all print jobs currently pending on a printer and allows you to delete or pause
any of your pending jobs.
In addition to pausing or canceling print jobs, you can elect to purge all pending
documents by selecting that option from the Printer pull-down menu, subject
to the security restrictions discussed earlier regarding other user's documents.
You can also change any of the properties for the selected printer by choosing Properties
from the Printer pull-down menu.
While we have already discussed most of the main printing features found in Windows 98, a number of other areas are worth considering. In this section, we look at how to print
While you normally print a document from within an application in which you are working, it is also possible to print a document without being in an application. This is done by dragging and dropping the document onto a printer icon. One of the ways to do this is to create a shortcut for one or more of your installed printers on your desktop. After you have done this, you can print documents by just dragging them from the desktop or any window and dropping them onto the printer shortcut.
To create a desktop shortcut for one of your installed printers, open the Printers folder. With either your left or right mouse button, select the printer's icon from the folder and drag it to the desktop. When you release the mouse button, a shortcut for the printer is created. If you prefer not to create a desktop shortcut for the printer, you can drag and drop documents onto the printer's icon in the Printers folder.
When you drag a document onto a printer's icon and drop it, Windows 98 opens the related application, prints the document within the program, and then closes that application. Because Windows 98 looks for a program that has previously been associated with that type of file in order for it to open an application and print the document, you need to have previously installed a program on your computer that is registered for handling that file type. Thus, if you want to print a document created in Microsoft Excel, you need to have Excel loaded on your computer because Windows 98 looks for an application associated with that file extension (in this case, files having an .xls or other Excel-related extension).
In addition to printing files by dragging and dropping them onto printer icons, you can also print them directly from disk. In most cases, this is the quickest way to print a document without having to open the application yourself.
To print a file directly from disk, simply select the file from within the Windows Explorer. The file can be located on any floppy drive, hard drive, or network drive to which you have access. Right-click on the file and choose Print. The printing process is identical to that in drag and drop printing. Thus, Windows 98 opens the application associated with that type of file, prints the file within that application, and then closes the application automatically.
While the print window that appears when you are printing from an application normally appears consistent from program to program, one difference occurs when you print a document from within Internet Explorer that contains multiple frames. When a Web page contains multiple frames, it means that, although it appears to be a single page, it is actually made up of multiple pages that appear within a single frameset. Each of these frames is a separate document that can be printed out through your computer.
When you print a page containing multiple frames, the print window appears with additional options not found when printing from other applications (see Figure 13.11). From this window, you can select to print the selected frame (which usually is the main, or largest, frame), to print all of the frames individually, or to print the frameset as it appears on your screen. You can also select the option to either print all linked documents, in which case Internet Explorer prints all pages for which hyperlinks appear on the page you are printing. Alternatively, you can print a table containing links for these documents.
For further information on printing within Internet Explorer, see Chapter 28, "Finding, Organizing, and Saving Web-Based Information."
While most of the applications you run on your computer are likely written for
Windows, you might have a few MS-DOS applications from which you will need to print.
Windows 98 fully supports printing from MS-DOS applications, although you do not
get the full benefits found in printing from Windows applications, such as EMF spooling.
All print jobs created by MS-DOS applications are intercepted by the 32-bit print
spooler prior to being sent to the printer, resulting in a quicker return of control
back to the application.
FIG. 13.11 When printing
an HTML document containing multiple frames, you are provided with several options
regarding which frames you want to print.
One of the problems encountered when printing color graphics is that the color displayed on your monitor might not match the color generated by the printer. To help alleviate this problem, Microsoft has included support for Image Color Matching (ICM) in Windows 98. While Windows 95 supports ICM 1.0, Windows 98 supports the newer ICM 2.0, which includes a number of technical improvements. The end result is a better correlation between the colors as they appear on your monitor and those generated by your color printer. Because ICM is supported on multiple platforms, the images you create in Windows 98 applications should appear virtually the same on computers that are running other ICM 2.0-compliant operating systems.
If you use a laptop computer, or if your printer is only available via a network connection, you are a good candidate for using the offline printing feature found in Windows 98. With a laptop computer, there may be many times when you are not physically connected to your printer, such as when you are working on a document while on a long flight. Similarly, if you work in a networked environment, there likely will be times that you cannot print due to problems connecting to the printer over the network. As its name implies, offline printing allows you to generate print jobs when you are not connected to a printer and allows you to have them printed at a later time.
NOTE Offline printing works only for portable and networked computers and also requires the use of the print spooler supplied with Windows 98. If you have configured the printer not to use print spooling, you have to enable this feature in order to put your printer into offline mode. Because offline printing is not supported for local printers, if you want to stop printing on a local printer, right-click on the printer's icon in the Printers folder and choose the Pause Printing command.
To use offline printing, open the Printers folder and select the printer you want to use offline. Right-click on the printer's icon and choose Use Printer Offline, at which point a check mark appears next to this choice. Any print jobs you generate are held in the queue until you instruct Windows 98 to actually print these jobs. When you want to print out the stored jobs, right-click on the printer's icon and deselect the Use Printer Offline option.
If your laptop is configured to be used with a docking station, when you boot your computer Windows 98 automatically selects offline printing if it detects that you are not connected to the docking station. If you later boot your laptop while being docked, the offline printing feature is turned off, and any stored print jobs are sent to your printer.
By changing the properties for a printer, you can select the paper size, the paper tray the printer should use, and other such settings as determined by the capabilities of your printer. The properties can be changed at any time either from the Printers folder or from within any application.
To change the printer paper properties from within an application, select Print
from theFile pull-down menu and then click on the Properties button.
You can also access these properties by right-clicking on the printer's icon in the
Printers folder and choosing Properties. In either event, a properties page
similar to that shown in Figure 13.12 appears (this example is from the WordPad application).
FIG. 13.12 You can change
a printer's paper configurations to best match the needs of the document you are
printing.
After the properties page appears, click on the Paper tab. From here you can select
the size of the paper on which you are printing as well as the layout of the print
job--that is, landscape or portrait. If your printer has multiple trays, an envelope
holder, or other paper sources, you can also change the paper source on this part
of the printer's properties page. As mentioned previously, because the properties
page appears differently from printer to printer, the display for your printer will
likely appear somewhat differently than that shown in Figure 13.12.
With Windows 98, you can set up multiple virtual printers, each of which points to a single physical printer. This allows you to create one configuration for high-quality graphics printing, one for landscape (as opposed to portrait) printing, or any other configurations you want. Each of these can be saved as a separate printer even though each points to a single printing device.
To have the operating system configure additional printers for this purpose, use the Add Printer Wizard to go through the same process that you used to install the printer previously, but this time give the printer a slightly different name. Thus, you might name one printer "High graphics" and another "Landscape."
When you install each of these printers, the Add Printer Wizard tells you that a driver for this type of printer is already installed on your computer. It asks whether you want to keep the existing driver or install this new one. Unless you have a version of the driver on a disk that is newer than the Windows 98 CD-ROM, choose to keep the existing driver.
After you have finished using the Add Printer Wizard, a new icon appears for this printer. Right-click on its icon and choose Properties. Configure the printer according to its new name. Thus, for the Landscape printer example earlier, select the option to use landscape printing rather than portrait.
After you have configured your new virtual printers, they also are available for use within your applications. Thus, when you have a print job that you want to have printed in landscape format, choose the Landscape printer rather than choosing your main printer. This gives you a quick and easy way to print in this format without having to change the printer's properties each time.
Although the focus of this chapter has involved installing and managing printers, you might need to remove installed printers and related devices from your computer. For example, if you buy a new printer and give the old one away, there would probably be no reason to keep the old printer's driver installed on your computer.
To remove a printer and its related drivers from your computer, open the Printers folder. Right-click on the printer's icon and choose Delete. Windows 98 then asks you to confirm that you want to remove that printer from your computer. Click on the Yes button, and the printer is then removed from your computer.
During the process of removing the printer, a dialog box appears asking whether you also want to remove the files that were used by that printer. The files to which Windows 98 is referring are the printer's driver and any other related files needed for use by that particular printer. If you think that you might use that printer in the future, you can choose No to keep these files on your computer. By doing so, you will not need to install the files from the Windows 98 CD-ROM the next time you add the printer to your computer. Otherwise, choose Yes to remove all the files associated with this printer from your computer. After this process has completed, the printer's icon is removed from the Printers folder.
The Help files that come with Windows 98 include a number of Troubleshooters, which are wizard-like guides to help you solve common print errors that might occur. If you experience a printing problem in Windows 98 and are not able to fix it on your own, you should try the Print Troubleshooter before seeking technical support.
To start the Print Troubleshooter, click on the Start button and select Help.
After the Help window opens, double-click on the Troubleshooting book icon and then
again on the Windows 98 Troubleshooters icon. This expands to show a list of Troubleshooters
from which you can select. Click on Print in this listing to open the Windows 98
Print Troubleshooter in the right pane of this window, as shown in Figure 13.13.
FIG. 13.13 The Print
Troubleshooter can help solve many of the most common printing problems in Windows
98.
To use the Troubleshooter, select the radio button for the type of problem that is
closest to that which you are experiencing. Then press the Next button and proceed
through the steps that are designed to help solve your problem. If there is no Troubleshooter
for your particular problem, or if the Troubleshooter does not fully solve the problem,
you might need to contact either your printer manufacturer or Microsoft, such as
by using the Windows Update tool, located off of the Start button. l
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