[RESOLVED] Epson Status Monitor 3 failure in XP

I'm seeing a lot of references to the problem I describe below:

Have 2 Epson inkjet printers, both connected via USB to a Win XP Pro (SP1) PC. Both of these printers, with the appropriate software, worked perfectly under Win98SE.

Downloaded the newest drivers and Status Monitor from Epson's website, and installed the printers. Drivers are ok, but the Status Monitor 3 software isn't showing ink levels, etc. in XP, and each printer job is taking between 5-10 minutes to spool and begin printing the first page. Status monitor always shows "communication problem", but the printers DO eventually print.

Lots of references to similar problems under XP. Does anybody know an actual solution or workaround to this problem? I'm hoping to not be forced to disable this background monitoring, as the ink-level monitoring is pretty important when I'm printing large photos.

Epson's own support team suggests I simply turn off all functions of the monitor, but don't offer ANY explanation or solution to the actual problems (d***heads!).

Any help is welcome...:D

Which Epson printers do you have?

Status monitor not working seems strange. Are you sure you installed it? I'm asking because XP when you install an Epson printer if you don't install the status monitor at the same time, then XP uses it's own and that is why the ink levels don't show. If you use the one provided by Epson like the one in the attachment below, you should be seeing the ink levels.

Epson Photo 1200, and the newer Epson Stylus C84. The software for the C84 (original version from Epson, says it's XP compatible) is where I'm assuming the Status Monitor 3 comes from.

Tried downloading the latest (supposedly...) version of Status Monitor 3 from Epson's own site, same symptoms...

I'm at work, can't post screenshots, but this is DEFINATELY Epson's software, not M$'s, and as I mentioned before, the tech at Epson just says "turn off all monitoring"....

Any ideas?

Well, I cruised Epson's website and didn't even find an XP driver for the 1200, nor did I find a status monitor download for the C84. The driver page for the 1200 has drivers for w2k only, and the status monitor is version 2. Which to me doesn't make sense except that if you are using status monitor 3 may be why it's not working correctly.

Other Epson products I've bought claimed compatible with XP, but you had to download the xp software from the website to make it work correctly.

The Status monitor software came on the C84 CD along with the drivers... the old status monitor that came originally with the 1200 doesn't work under XP (can't find that d*&mned CD anyway).

I discovered that both will actually PRINT perfectly so long as I completely disable the status monitor... but with the price of Epson ink's, I don't want one of them unexpectedly running empty when I'm trying to print something critical.

Epson finally responded with a really, REALLY convoluted set of instructions to try... after I give it a whirl, I'll let you know what happens... but I don't hold a lot of hope for this.

It's my personal belief is that Epson NEVER expected these two models to work together with the monitor... so we'll see what happens!

Ok. I understand completely why you'd want a status monitor, it's kind of hard to guess how much inks are left. :rolleyes:

I was thinking maybe you could revert the status monitor to the version two, but I am not going to say for sure this would work because I'm not sure the c84 would recognize it.

I have seen this many many times when more than one printers are connected to the same computer and it's not a problem unique to Epson either.

Several things you can try:

1) Make sure the Spoolmanager is on. Where you'll find this setting depends on the models but the manual should tell you. It may say "Print Manager" or something like that.

2) In Properties > Ports, try turning "Enable Bidirectional Support" on or off and see which one works.

3) While your in Properties > Ports, take a look at the ports assigned to the printers. You may see that both of them are assigned to the same USB001 "Virtual Printer Port for USB". Try assign one of the printer to another "Virtual Printer Port for USB" or even one of the DOT4 ports.

4) If you try any or combination(s) of the above and it still doesn't work you can try hooking one of the printer to the parallel port but make sure in the BIOS the parallel mode is set to one of the bi-directional settings such as ECP or EPP. This usually will solve the problem.

5) If all fails, you can simply turn off "Communication Error" warning. Usually it is in Properties > Utility > Speed & Progress > Monitoring Preference. It's not a fix but since you say the prints eventually do come out anyway this will at least avoid the annoying message keep coming up.

Well folks,

Epson apparently cannot support their products under these conditions. All I've gotten from them is the expected "uninstall everything, edit the registry, download the newest, blah blah blah, reinstall" c*$p that's becoming SOP in the industry.

I really like the print quality of my Epson products, but I'm sick of the constant ink/printhead problems, the endless cleaning cycle requirements, outrageous price of their inks, and now - the absolute complete lack of reasonable tech support.

Anybody want to buy a couple of barely used, but hardly functional, Epson printers? I'm giving really serious consideration to Canon and HP at the moment, and leaning more to Canon because of HP's offshore support policies.

Man, I SO hate companies treating their products as if we should all simply consider them disposable. I'm just sick to death of this endless, mindless, idiocy.

<whew> I feel just a little better now!

Sometimes I do wish VDr would revert back to the old rule when you could delete your own post.

VDR allows a member to edit a post within 24 hours of posting but a member has to contact a moderator to delete a post. I don't see this rule changing anytime soon. Complications formed is why it is this way falcon2000.

I finally solved the Communication Error that occurs with Epson Status Monitor 3 on Windows XP. This worked for me and if you have the same situation, it should work for you.

The Problem

I have a print server (PC running XP) with an Epson 1280 attached via USB. The printer is shared on the network. When printing from the server, no problem, status monitor works fine. When printing from any machine on the network, the file prints but Status Monitor 3 shows a Communication Error and you can't see the ink level or printing progress.

The Solution

On the print server machine (the machine with the printer directly connected), open the printer control panel for the Epson printer (Start --> Settings --> Printers & Faxes --> Epson 1280). Select Properties under the Printer menu. From the Properties window, General tab, click on the Printing Preferences button. Select the Utilities tab and click on the Speed & Progress button at the bottom. From the Speed & Progress window click on the Monitoring Preferences button. From the Monitoring Preferences window click the checkbox marked "Allow monitoring of shared printers". Click OK button on all the windows. Now when the status monitor runs on other machines they will be able to monitor the shared printer.

--GaryM

Appreciate the information, and glad it worked for you, but that isn't a solution to the generic XP problem, but rather a solution to a "shared printer" monitor problem.

In my case, the printer is (was) plugged directly into the XP machine, not another network machine, and this method didn't work.

But, it very likely will help someone else. In the meantime, I've gotten rid of the printers in question and am waiting to buy a new Epson photo model shortly.

Way to go, Gary M....glad I read your reply to the problem, as I was just going to write the same solution.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MorrisPhotoArt

I finally solved the Communication Error that occurs with Epson Status Monitor 3 on Windows XP. This worked for me and if you have the same situation, it should work for you.

The Problem

I have a print server (PC running XP) with an Epson 1280 attached via USB. The printer is shared on the network. When printing from the server, no problem, status monitor works fine. When printing from any machine on the network, the file prints but Status Monitor 3 shows a Communication Error and you can't see the ink level or printing progress.

The Solution

On the print server machine (the machine with the printer directly connected), open the printer control panel for the Epson printer (Start --> Settings --> Printers & Faxes --> Epson 1280). Select Properties under the Printer menu. From the Properties window, General tab, click on the Printing Preferences button. Select the Utilities tab and click on the Speed & Progress button at the bottom. From the Speed & Progress window click on the Monitoring Preferences button. From the Monitoring Preferences window click the checkbox marked "Allow monitoring of shared printers". Click OK button on all the windows. Now when the status monitor runs on other machines they will be able to monitor the shared printer.

--GaryM

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C.A. as shiva_42 already said, the problem he was having has nothing to do with what the solution Mr. Gary M posted. I'm going to now close this thread as a resolved issue. The problem Shiva was having was not due to shared printers on a network but stand alone printer from one era to another.

Please don't resurrrect outdated threads. Especially when that thread has a Resolved mark on it.