Star Micronics NX-2450 User Manual

U M

NX-2450EY!RH”

You can print at either 50V0(half) or 67Y0(two-thirds)

No

normal size by using the Zoom mode. This is useful for
printing wide documents, such as spreadsheets, on a

single sheet.

Change the zoom size as follows. Put the printer in
n m Hold down the [~) key and press
the [TiEXEV_]key to cycle through the three zoom settings.
The zoom light indicates the current selection as shown
in the table below.

I

Z

50Y0

6

10 o

I

I

Z l

F

I

Press the [_’) key to confirm your selection and put
the printer back in r m

The printer beeps once to indicate that 500/0zoom has
been selected, twice for 670A,or sounds a very short
beep,to indicate that Zoom mode has been cancelled;
that is, 100?Aohas been selected.

You can disable the Zoom feature by setting Electronic
DIP Switch setting A4 to OFF (see page 41).

T seh n e i y a p f a c
ruWi

To reduce the level of noise generated by the printer

during operation, you can put the printer into Quiet

mode. To do this, put the printer in r m and

press the [~] key. The printer will beep once and the

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Adjusting vertical alignment

Note: Youmayneverhaveto usethisfunction.Useitonlyif graph-

icsprint-outsappearstrange(asintheillustrationsbelow).

After you have been using your printer for some time,
you may find that when you print graphics, the printed

dots are slightly out of line with each other. For exam­ple, what you intend to look like this:

11111

may come out like this:

1,1,1,1,1,
11111 11111

or like this:

This is due to the mechanical parts of the printer work-

ing slightly out of alignment. It happens very rarely and
you may never meet this problem. However, if it does
occur, you can cure it as follows:

,1,1,1,1,1

●

Turn the printer off and make sure that it is loaded
~th paper (cut sheet or fanfold).

●

Hold down both the [m] and the [-] keys.

Q

Turn on the printer. The printer will beep once.

●

After a second or two, release both keys.

The printer will then print something like

* * * DOT JiJ)JIJs TMENT SETTING * * *

LQ –3 :

111111111111111111111

111111111111111111111

(The number before the vertical bars may not be “-3”).
After printing the bars, the printer will feed the paper so

that you can see the print-out clearly.

Each vertical bar is actually two bars. You can use the

[=] key to move the bottom row of bars to the left, and

the [=] key to move them to the right.

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*** DOT ADJUSTMENT SETTING ***

Each time you press either of these two keys, the printer
prints a new test line and a new offset value.

If you are using fanfold paper, the printer will reverse
feed the paper before printing the test pattern again.

After printing the pattern, the printer will feed the fan-

fold paper back up again so that you can see it clearly.
In the illustration above, you would want to move the

bottom row to the right; pressing the [=] key would

give you the following print-out:

●

The bars are better aligned now. Keep using the
m keY until the two rows are aligned.

●

You have now aligned the printer in Letter Quality

(LQ),mode.By pressing the [-] key, you can now

correct the dot alignment of draft mode.

There are five modes in which the dot alignment may

need’to be corrected: LQ, DRAFT, DRAFT COND (con­densed), GRAPHICS A and GRAPHICS B. Each mode
must be adjusted separately. Cycle through these modes

by pressing the [m] key (“cycling” means that if you

are in the last mode, GRAPHICS B, and you press the

[m] key, the printer will go back to LQ mode). The dif-

ferent modes may have different alignments because of
the way in which the printer’s electronics drive the mov­ing parts.

●

When you have adjusted all the dot alignments, hold

down the [=] key and press the [=] key. The
printer will print “*** END ***”, eject the current
page and go into ready mode.

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Testing the printer

Short test

A short test prints out the version number of the soft­ware contained in the printer’s ROM, followed by seven

lines of text. Each line is offset by one character from
the line above. If the color ribbon is in use, each line will

be printed in a different color.
To perform a short test, power up the printer while hold-

ing-down the [m] key: The te~t pri~t out should

appear as shown below.

Note: Thistestprintsacrosstheentirewidthofthecarriage.Itisa

goodideato makesurethattheprinterisloadedwiththe
widestpossiblepaperavailabletoavoidthepossibilityof
damagetotheprintheadortheplaten.

Long test

A long test prints out the version number of the software

in the printer’s ROM, followed by the current Electronic
DIP Switch settings, the current vertical alignment
adjustment settings and the complete character set in
each available font and pitch setting. The printer prints
this sequence repeatedly until powered off.

To perform a long test, power up the printer while hold-

ing down the [m] key.

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This test prints across the entire width of the carnage. It
is a good idea to make sure that the printer is loaded
with the widest possible paper available to avoid the
possibility of damage to the print head or the platen.

This test can generate many lines of text and graphics,

so it is a good idea to use continuous fanfold paper
rather than single sheets. The test continues indefinitely
until the printer is turned off.

Printing out a hexadecimal dump

If you are writing your own programs to send output to
the printer, it is sometimes useful to print out the raw
data that the printer is receiving.

When you perform a hexadecimal dump, all codes (char-

acter codes and control codes) are printed out in hexa­decimal format. The printer does not execute any of the
normally executable codes it receives (such as OA- line
feed). It simply prints them out.

Perform a hexadecimal dump as follows:

●

Turn off the printer.

●

Turn on the printer while holding down the [=]
and [FXWQ keys. The printer beeps once.

●

Begin printing from your computer. Instead of a nor­mal print-out, data will be printed in sixteen col­umns (two groups of eight) of hexadecimal numbers.

The equivalent printable characters, or dots for

unprintable codes, are printed to the right of each
row of hexadecimal numbers.

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●

When the printer stops printing, put the printer in
not-ready-mode. The printer now prints the final
line of the hexadecimal dump.

●

To resume normal operation, turn the printer off
and on again. (Unless you switch it off and on the
printer will continue to print in hexadecimal).

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Chapter 5

The two optional accessories that you can purchase with
your NX-2450 Rainbow/Colour printer are the push
tractor unit (PT-10Q),which allows you to print on fan-

fold paper (continuous stationery), and the serial-to-par­allel interface converter (SPC-8K), which allows you to
connect the printer to your computer via your comput­er’s 25-pin serial port.

Options

Note:

Makesurethattheprinterisswitchedoff,wheninstalling
eitherthepushtractorunitortheserial-to-parallelinterface
converter.

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Push tractor unit

Installing the push tractor unit

The push tractor unit allows you to print on continuous

fanfold paper up to 10”wide. The push tractor unit con­sists of two end pieces joined by two silver metal rods.

The metal rods have two black sliding tractor units and

a black sliding support piece mounted on them.
Install the push tractor unit using the following steps:

●

Make sure the printer is switched off.

●

Open the front cover by hooking your fingers under

the two small projecting tabs on either side of the
front cover. Grip the cover firmly and pull upwards.

The front cover will come loose.

●

Now pull the cover up and forwards so that it swings
open.

●

Open the rear cover by pushing it backwards so that
it folds back and down.

●

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Pull the release lever forward.

●

Hold the push tractor unit with your thumb and
forefinger on the ridges near the top and with the
slot facing towards you.

Ridges-

●

Hook the slots in the end pieces over
behind and above the platen roller.

As seenfrom behind the printer

the shaft just

/‘1

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●

Using your forefinger and thumb squeeze the end

piece levers against the rear part of the end pieces.

Rotate the tractor feed unit downwards until the

bottom of the levers fit snugly into the indentations

in the metal plate inside the printer body.

Endpie

Bonom of Iev

Indentation
metal plate

As seenfrom behind the printer

As seenfrom behind the printer
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●

Release the two levers and check that the tractor
unit is properly secured. The unit is now locked in
place. Make sure that the covers on both tractors
are closed.

●

Close the rear cover by swinging it forwards and
upwards. Click it firmly back into place.

●

Close the front cover.

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Loading fanfold paper

●

Position the stack of fanfold paper behind the
printer.

●

Turn the printer off.

●

Pull the release lever forward.

●

If there is a single sheet that has been fed into the
printer, remove it.

●

Open the front cover by hooking your fingers under
the two small projecting tabs on either side of the
front cover. Grip the cover firmly and pull upwards.
The front cover will come loose.

●

Now pull the cover up and forwards so that it swings
open.

●

Pass the fanfold paper through the horizontal slot in
the back of the printer.

●

Open the rear cover by pushing it backwards so that
it folds back and down. Pull the paper through.

●

Pull the gray levers on the tractors forward and
adjust the tractors’ positions by sliding them side­ways.

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●

Lock the tractors in position by pushing the levers
back down again.

✌☛

Open the covers on both tractors and position the
paper by aligning the holes in the paper with the
pins on the tractors.

●

Ensure that the paper is properly aligned on the
tractor pins. Otherwise, it may tear or jam.

●

Close the tractor covers. If necessary, make any
final adjustments to the paper position. Release one
or both of the tractors by pulling the gray levers for­ward and moving the tractors sideways.

●

Push the gray levers backwards again to

fixthe

paper in position.

●

Close the rear cover by swinging it forwards and
upwards. Click it firmly back into place.

●

Close the front cover. Pull the paper delivery selector
forwards and down.

●

Turn the printer on. The printer will beep to indicate

that the paper is not completely loaded yet.

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77

●

Press the [-) key. The fanfold paper will be fed in
to the starting position (if you want to adjust this
position, use the procedure for setting the auto load
position, described on page 60 of Chapter 4).

Note: Keepthereleaseleverintheforwardpositionwhileprinting

onfanfoldpaper.

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Printing on fanfold paper

Two useful features of the NX-2450 Rainbow/Colour

that facilitate the use of continuous stationery are paper
parking (fanfold paper can remain installed in the
printer while you temporarily switch to printing on sin­gle sheets), and the tear-off function (you can remove
printed output without losing the current paper posi­tion). These are described in the following sections.

You can also use the same paper position adjustment
techniques, such as line feed and form feed, that you
use with single cut sheets. These are described on
page 59 of Chapter 4.

You can also set a new auto load position (the distance

from the top of each new page at which the printer auto-

matically starts printing) specifically for fanfold paper.
This is independent of the cut sheet auto load position.
Both auto load positions can be saved as part of a
macro, so that you do not have to reset them each time

you switch the printer off and on again.

Setting the auto load position is described on page 60 of
Chapter 4. Saving macro settings is described on
page 62 of Chapter 4.

When printing on continuous stationery, take care not

to print too close to the perforations which separate
each sheet. This can cause poor quality output, paper
misalignment or paper jamming. The recommended
printable area for fanfold paper is shown in the following
diagram.

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If you need to use continuous multi-part forms, use the
type which has both side edges glued together. Do not

use forms with more than three parts.
Make sure that the print gap is correctly set for the

thickness of paper that you are using. Setting the print
gap is described on page 63 of Chapter 4.

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Parking paper

If you want to use single sheets, but do not want to
remove the fanfold paper, you can “park” the fanfold
paper.

●

Tear off the paper at a perforation, so that not more

than half a page protrudes above the paper delivery
selector (if necessary, put the printer in not-ready
mode and feed paper through by pressing the

= keY until a Perforation iSjust visible above

the paper delivery selector).

●

Make sure that the printer is in ready mode and
that the release lever is forward. Press the [-]
key. The printer now automatically feeds the paper
backwards until it is no longer in contact with the
platen.

●

Push the release lever backwards. Now you can load
and print on single sheets.

When you want to resume using fanfold paper, you can
“unpark” it as described in the following section.

Unparking paper

To resume using fanfold paper, you can “unpark” the
fanfold paper as follows:

●

Remove all single sheets from the printer.

●

Pull the release lever forward.

●

Press the [-] key. The printer feeds the parked

fanfold paper back into position, ready for printing.

Note:

Youcanalwaysunparkpaper,whethertheprinterisin “ready
mode”or “not-readymode”.

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Using the tear-off function

You can remove finished
ing the current position of the paper.

●

Make sure that the printer is in ready mode, hold
down the (-] key and then hold down the [-]
key. Keep both keys held down. The printer starts to
feed the paper through the printer.

●

Release both keys. The printer automatically goes
into not-ready mode.

●

Tear off the paper, using the paper delivery selec­tor’s tear-assist edge.

●

Press the [w] key again. The printer winds the
paper back to its former position so that printing
can be resumed. The printer remains in ready

mode.

fanfold output without disturb-

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Serial-to-parallel interface converter

You can connect the printer to your computer via one of

your computer’s serial ports using the serial-to-parallel
converter (SPC-8K). To do this, you will also need an
additional serial converter cable.

To connect the printer to your computer using the

serial-to-parallel converter, proceed as follows (you will
also find it helpful to refer to the SPC-8K User’s Manual
and your MS-DOS or Windows User’s Guide).

Connecting the serial-to-parallel converter

Serial connector

Clear button ~“

Centronics connector

●

Turn off the printer and unplug the printer’s power

cable.

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●

Plug the interface converter’s Centronics connector
into the socket on the side of the printer. Secure it
with the retaining clips.

●

Connect the interface connector’s 25-pin D-type
connector to one end of the serial converter cable.

●

Plug the other end of the serial converter cable into

one of your computer’s serial ports. The computer’s

serial ports are usually labelled COM1, COM2 etc.
COM1 is normally a 9-pin serial port and COM2 is
normally a 25-pin port.

COM2

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . .

\

●

Make sure that the serial-to-parallel converter is

/

resting on a stable, level surface, so that it will not
be prone to vibration or damage.

Note: Consultyourdealerifyouareunsureaboutthetypeofserial

convertercablethatyouneed.

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Setting the converter’s DIP switches

●

Set the DIP switches on the converter so that the
settings match the settings you intend to make on
your computer.

●

The DIP switches on the serial-to-parallel converter
correspond to the following settings. The equivalent
settings that you will need to make in MS-DOS’s
AUTOEXEC.BAT file, or in the Ports option in Win­dows’ Control Panel, are also listed. The converter’s
default settings are shown in gray.

Switch

I

t

1

2
3

7

8

Function

1

Data length

Baud rate
Baud rate

I

Parity

Protocol

Data length is the length in bits of the data unit (or byte)
that the computer transmits. Normally this is set to 8.

Switch 1 i

I

Data length DOS/Windows setting

Parity is a means of checking for transmission errors.

I

Switch 2 Switch 5

Parity DOS/Windows setting

OFF

OFF

1

Even E

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Protocol (or “handshaking”) is the communications con­vention used between the computer and printer to regu­late the flow of data. DTR is the most commonly used
protocol.

I Switch3 1 Switch4

I OFF I ON

Protocol I

I

ETX/ACK

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I

Baud rate is the rate in bits per second at which data is
sent to the printer.Typically 9600 or 19200 is used.

Switch 6ISwitch 7~Switch 8 Baud rate DOSIWindows setting

OFF OFF OFF
OFF

ON OFF
ON OFF ON

OFF

I

ON 300 bps

OFF

150 bps 150

2400 bps i
4800 bps

2400
4800

300

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Setting up a serial connection

Make settings on your computer to correspond to the
settings you have made using the DIP switches.

On a Windows computer

●

Double-click the Control Panel icon in the Main win­dow.

●

Double-click the Printers icon

●

Make sure that NX-2450 Rainbow/Colour is
selected in the InstaUed Printers list.

●

Click on Connect

●

Click on the serial port (COMn) to which the serial-

to-parallel converter is connected.

●

Click OK to return to the Printers window.

●

Click Close to return to the ControZPaneZwindow.

●

Double-click on Ports. The Ports dialog box appears.

●

Click on the name of the port to which the serial-to-

parallel converter is connected.

●

Click on Settings.

●

For each setting (Baud Rate, Data Bits, Parity, Stop
Bits and Flow Control (protocol)) select the appropri-

ate setting from the pull-down menu (alternatively,

you can type in your selections directly).

●

Click OK to return to the Ports window.

●

Click Close to return to the ControZPanel window.

Page

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On an MS-DOS computer

If you are using an IBM PC or compatible running
MS-DOS, edit the AUTOEXEC.BAT file to include a line

that reads:
MODELPT1:=COMn:

n stands for a number: 1,2, 3 etc.
COMn must match the name of the serial port to which

the serial-to-parallel converter is connected. Usually it

will be COM2.

This line sends printer output to the COMn serial port.
Also add a line of the form
MODE

to set up the COMn port to match the DIP switch set-

tings on the serial-to-parallel converter. For example,
MODECOM2:9600,N, 8, 1, p
will set up COM2 to run at 9600 baud, with no parity, a

data length of 8 bits, and 1stop bit (an MS-DOS byte-

terminating convention). The ‘p’ jndicates that the
printer will continually try to re-transmit data, should

an error’occur.

Refer to your MS-DOSUser’s Guide if you need further

information on the MODE command.

COMn: baud,pari ty,data length,stopbits,p

Page

88

Chapter 6

Your NX-2450 Rainbow/Colour printer should perform
without any problem most of the time. However, things
will go wrong from time to time. A list of common prob­lems and corresponding suggestions for curing them is
given below.

A further section, Checking system softuxu-esettings,

suggests ways for you to check whether your system
software (MS-DOS or Windows) is correctly set up for

printing.

If the suggested remedies do not cure the problem, con­sult the store where you purchased your printer for

assistance.

Note: Theprintercontainshighvoltages.Do nottryanyrepairoper-

ationotherthanthosedescribedinthischapter.Otherwise,
youcouldreceivean electricshockorcausedamageto the
printer.Attemptingsuchanoperationwillvoidyourwarranty.

Troubleshooting

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Common problems and solutions

Possiblecause

Printer is not receiving
power

Possiblecause

The ribbon is jammed,
twisted or not set properly ~
between the print head and
the print head shield.

~Action

Check whether the power
cord is correctly connected.

1

If it is, try a different power

I

cord.
Check whether the power

source is working by
unplugging the printer and
plugging in another device.

Action

1

~Make sure that the ribbon

cartridge is correctly
installed. Refer to preparing

the printer on page 9 of

Chapter 2.

The print gap is not set

correctly.

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90

Use the adjustment lever to
set the print gap. Move the

~lever to a lower (darker)

setting. See Setting theprint
gap on page 63 of

I Chapter 4.

Possiblecause

Action

The wrong emulation is

selected.

The wrong printer has been

selected by your
application program or
system software.

The computer system

software is not set up

properly for the printer or
for the type of interface
cable that you are using.

The interface cable is

incorrectly connected, or
damaged.

Check the emulation
selection (see Selecting

which emulation to use on
page 46 of Chapter 4), and
change it if necessary.

Check the printer selection
in your application or
system software. See the
following section, Checking

system software settings.

Check the system software
settings. See the following
section, Checking system

software settings.

Check that the printer
interface cable is correctly
connected. If it is, try a
different cable.

Possiblecause

Your application software

is overriding the control
panel font selection. This
does not apply to systems
running Windows.

Action

Use the control panel to
inhibit font selection by

application software. See
the section Presenting
softwarefont selection on
page 54 of Chapter 4.

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