Adding the printer

1. Select File Menu > New Printer… and select your printer from the list in the menu, then click OK. Our list of supported printers is updated regularly so we advise you to keep an eye on the Support Printers article.
   
   The printers available for you will depend on the level of Digital Print RIP licence you have (Level 1, 2, or 3). Level 3 gives full access to the list. If the printer you require access to is greyed out, you can upgrade your licence to the next level. Please contact AVA Sales for more details.
   
   A new window opens to define the parameters of the printer. For Mimaki printers, the output method must be specified。
   
   While for the some printers an Output folder should be set.
   
2. Select the Printer Active check box and leave this window open from now on.

   
   The Printer Active option is a master switch controlling all the Print Queues set up for a particular printer. This option allows you to stop printing from all Print Queues (allocated to the same printer) at once, without having to stop each queue individually.

Setting up the print queue

The ability to queue print files enables users to control their time and projects more efficiently. To create a new Print Queue go to File Menu > Open Print Queue… and select the Print Queue folder. This folder needs to have been pre-made and can exist anywhere on the server. It must also have read and write privileges applied to it.

Advantages of the Print Queue

• The ability to view the list of print files waiting in the Print Queue. 

• Previews of your print file
• The name of the current ink setting being used is displayed at the bottom of the window.
  
• The name of the Print Queue and the printer type used are displayed in the title bar at the top of the window. If you hold down the ⌘ key and click on the folder icon in the toolbar, it reveals the location of your Print Queue making it easy to locate and access.
  
• The priorities of print files can be changed so that a more urgent prints can be sent straight away instead of waiting for it to reach its position through the queue. Simply drag each print file to its preferred position. A thin line appears to indicate the new position.
• Individual jobs can be printed immediately. To do this, highlight the print file and click on the Print button in the toolbar. The file will print and override the queuing order.

  
  

• The ability to customize the toolbar. The first time you see the Print Queue Window, it will not contain all of the buttons available. Click on the Customize icon in order to view the items available and change those selected. To add a button to the Print Queue Window, drag it to the tool bar, repeating as necessary, then click the Done button in the bottom right hand corner.
• The ability to start and stop the queue, just by clicking on the Start Queue or Stop Queue button. If you click on Start Queue, the spooled file is at the top of the list is printed. Once printed it is automatically removed from the list.
• Any print files can be deleted at any time whilst in the Print Queue Window, but only one ca be deleted at a time. Highlight a print file and click on the Delete icon.
• Set and control the colour separation settings. Click on the Colour Separation button in the tool bar and a sheet opens where you can set all generic items such as ink setting, ink level, dither pattern, dither scale and minimum low tone percentage.
  
• Control and change the printer settings. Click on the Printer Settings button and a window appears which enables you to change the number of passes, or heater settings, etc. The settings in the window will change, depending on which printer you are printing to.
  
  

Creating multiple queues

AVA Digital Print RIP allows multiple Print Queues for each printer and this provides a number of key advantages.

One benefit addresses a common problem where print parameters are often modified when, for example, the substrate or other settings (ink settings, resolution…) are changed. Sometimes, remembering these numerous setting changes can be difficult and may lead to designs being printed with the wrong settings.

To reduce mistakes, AVA Digital Print RIP works with multiple print queues using different printer settings.

For example, you can have a print queue using 720 dpi for high quality prints and another print queue using 360 dpi. The user sends their prints to the appropriate print queue, thus avoiding any confusion.

Another use of multiple print queues is that each queue can be assigned a different priority, thus helping users to prioritise projects just by selecting the appropriate queue.

Queue Priority

To efficiently control the print order of multiple print queues, users can define the priority of each queue. An urgent print queue can be created and set to High priority in order to print designs immediately without having to stop the other queues.

1. Select a Print Queue by clicking on its window.
2. Go to Queue Menu > Queue Settings…or click on the Queue Settings button in the tool bar.
3. Choose the queue priority required and click OK. There are three options: High, Normal and Low.
   
4. Repeat this set up as required for each Print Queue.

Print from recent queue first

Used in conjunction with the Continuous Printing function found in the Printer Settings for HP printers, this option ensures the rip favours printing files from the active print queue before moving on to process files in other print queues. If this option is not ticked, the HP printers may favour newer files sent to other print queues, meaning the finishing process will occur between prints, thus slowing the printing process down.

Keeping spool files

Normally, files are automatically deleted from the queue once they have been printed, however it is possible to keep print jobs after they have been processed. This can be useful if you know you will need to reprint the same job in the near future. Time is saved because the file does not need to be spooled again and colours will be correct because the settings are contained in the file

1. Select a print queue by clicking on its window.
2. Go to Queue Menu > Queue Settings…
3. In the After Printing option, select Keep File
4. Once print files have printed, the spool files are moved to a folder called ‘PrintedItems’ in the print queue folder. This folder is automatically created for you when Keep File is selected in the Queue Settings.
   
   The files can be reprinted either by opening them with the AVA Digital Print RIP application (File Menu > Open and select the relevant print file) or by dragging and dropping the file into the active Print Queue window within the Finder.If you have not printed any files yet, the ‘PrintedItems’ folder will not exist.
   
   Review this setting as required for each printer and print queue.
5. Keep an eye on the ‘PrintedItems’ folder and try to review it on a regular basis to control the valuable disk space it uses. We recommend moving the printed items to an external hard disk regularly, so that you do not run out of disk space on your computer.

Activating an inksetting

The ink setting and printer settings selected influence the gamut of the printer and how the inks are controlled. Each ink setting has corresponding printer settings which must be configured for use with a specific ink set. The printer settings should not be changed from those recommended unless advised by an AVA technician.

First, click on the Colour Separation button in the tool bar or choose Queue Menu > Colour Separation. A sheet will open with a selection of generic settings to be configured.

• Ink Setting - lists all ink settings placed in the ink settings folder located at: Home / Library / Application Support / AVA Digital Print RIP / Ink Settings. Select the one to be used with the active queue.

When you select this menu, you have the option to ‘Choose Other…’

Use this option to navigate to an ink setting which is not in the Ink Settings folder mentioned above.

• Channel Order - override the physical ink order in the printer to better match your spot printed files. An example of when you would use this is when printing the InkLoadingTest chart ahead of creating an ink setting.

Your chart may be set up to print Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black, but your printer may print Black, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow. Instead of changing your layer order in the file, you can alter the channel order of the printer. Simply input the physical channel numbers in the order you want them to print.

For the example above, the channel order would be input as 2,3,4,1.

• Ink Level - determines how much ink the printer puts down on to your substrate.
• Dither pattern - choose from AVA Dither 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6. Different dither patterns reduce the possibility of banding effects when printing with variable dot as well as allowing the pass level to be reduced.

As an indication to the difference between Dither 5 and Dither 6, please see the snapshot below. Small dots are red, medium dots are blue and large dots are black:

• Dither Scale - add noise to existing dither patterns to reduce banding issues caused by blocked heads, damaged nozzles, uneven media and deflections. Choose from the scale of 1 – 5, with 1 being very fine noise and 5 being quite coarse. Changing the Dither Scale setting does not require a new ink setting but a new printer profile will need to be created.
• Do not print tones less than - allows you to remove light dot coverage which causes obvious dither patterns on some printers. The tone level you choose is a compromise between clean prints and colour accuracy. When creating icc profiles, set the percentage back to 0% to print the 855 target with a true tonal representation and avoid any colour clipping caused by removing the light dots.

Printer Settings

Set each print queue with the correct printer settings, as defined by your AVA technician, as well as the corresponding printer profile for the chosen ink setting.

Setting Printer Settings

1. In the Print Queue Window, click on the Printer Settings button.
2. Configure your printer settings as directed by AVA and take a screen shot of the settings for future reference. (Hold down ⌘ ⇧ 4 and drag over the window to create a snapshot).

The picture clipping created will be called Screenshot and will be found on the desktop. Name the clipping by highlighting it and pressing Enter on the keyboard and then store it somewhere safe so that you can refer to it later if necessary.

The actual settings available in the window will vary greatly depending on the printer model you have. Some important settings are:

• Resolution - determines the output resolution of the printer and controls the quality of the print.
• Variable Dot - allows AVA to define the size of the ink dots printed and create an improved dither pattern.
• Override Front Panel Settings - allows AVA to change settings to override the default settings of the hardware.
• Print Mode / Passes - indicates the number of passes the heads will make to print the information. An increased number of passes will improve the quality and colour of your prints, but will decrease speed.
• High Speed - uses more nozzles during the printing process. Refer to your printer specifications for more details.
• BiDirectional - prints when the heads pass over the media in both directions. As opposed to Uni-Directional which only prints in one direction.
• Number of Overprints - prints the same information in the same area.
• Cut Media - cuts media after printing (not available on all printers).
• Drying Times - allows you to adjust the drying time per line or per document.
• Ink Source - allows you to assign either the front, rear or all heads to be used when printing. This is commonly used when there are two different sets of inks installed (for example reactive inks in the front heads and acid dyes in the rear).
• Ink Set - only used for certain printer models. This must correspond with the set of inks installed in the hardware.
• B&W Prints sent to head 0 black and white prints from AVA defines which head is used for black.

There are additional optional settings you can apply in the AVA Digital Print rip, such as customised text, head test strips and crop marks. Please search these terms to learn more.