Brother QL-1110NWB Printing Issues

[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Tres,

So I ended up purchasing the Brother QL-1110NWB thermal printer and installed it to my Windows 10 PC wirelessly (wi-fi).

I changed the name of the printer to this new printer and I tried printing from my website like I normally do with QZ Tray but it doesn't seem to be printing the label.  It's strange because I'll get a Windows 10 notification saying the printer is out of paper but that's not the case.

If I open up the PDF file directly and print to the QL-1110NWB thermal printer it prints out fine.  I attached the log file of what QZ Tray shows when I try to print.

Thank you,

Bernardo

[Bernie]

So, I was able to finally print to the Brother QL printer but I had to remove all settings relating to "orientation", "width", and "height"; please see attached updated QZ Tray log file.

I currently have the die-cut perforated 4"x6" sample labels that came with this printer but even listing width @ 4" and height @ 6" it didn't print to the QL printer; I don't know why.

I'm still waiting to receive my continuous 4" x 100' labels that I ordered, which are not die-cut perforated labels; so for these labels I would like to specify the width @ 4" and height @ 3" but I'm not sure if it will print properly with QZ Tray if I specify the width/height.  I guess I'll test this one once I receive these continuous 4" x 100' label roll.

Thank you,

Bernardo

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Bernardo:

Thanks for the follow up email. I was just about to reply with some recommendations regarding the config. Not all drivers support the size configs, so now we know that the QL series is one of them. There are printers that allow negative margins in the config as well, like my laserjet, but Zebra label printers won't print if these are passed.

Unfortunately it often becomes a matter of trial and error with each manufacturer writing different drivers for hardware and firmware of varying capabilities.

Brother QL printers can be finicky about the data because they support a variety of sizes as well as continuous feed paper, all driven by physical holes in the label stock holder. They can process ESC/P commands, Brother Raster graphics, and Templates too, so it can get very confusing. My QL-820NWB also supports black and red thermal printing, which has caused some interesting errors when testing. They are reliable machines, though.

I think that once you have your continuous roll paper installed, the printer should know the width of the label stock based on the holes in the holder, and the driver should be able to match your PDF to the width to the physical paper with ScaleContent as you've used here.

Kind regards,

Lite

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[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Lite,

Thanks for the quick reply!

Yes, I definitely like this Brother QL thermal printer; hopefully I can get it to print properly.

I didn't notice before but the box also came with a sample continuous roll that's 2.4" x 26'.  I was able to print properly in Adobe by changing the paper size width to 2.4" then setting height to 4" in the Brother printer properties. 

However, then tried going to the https://demo.qz.io/#pxlContent but no matter what configuration I enter it doesn't seem to print at all.  The power button on the QL just starts blinking red and I have to reset the printer and then try again.  I tried different orientations and different WxH sizes and I also tried leaving everything blank but nothing prints out.

Is there any way I can diagnose this to get this to work properly?

The main reason I liked this thermal printer so much, besides being wireless (bluetooth/wi-fi), is the continuous label because then I could print out different size labels depending on the label I need without changing label rolls but this seems to be not working as I thought it would.

Thank you,

Bernardo

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Sorry to hear that it's not working on the continuous paper. What is the label product number? I'd be happy to pick up a roll and try it on my QL-820, as it can accommodate that width.

The best way to analyze the difference between the print jobs is to change the driver destination from a port (in your case an IP address) to a flat file and compare Adobe vs. QZ-Tray.

It's possible that QZ-Tray is appending an extra character (or stripping some characters) and therefore confusing the printer.

Does the printer give you any other error messages? The blinking red light usually indicates the wrong paper for the print job, or the wrong print job for the paper.

Looking forward to your reply.

Lite

[Lite Finocchiaro]

I was able to print our PDF sample on the black/red paper via QZ-Tray, but it's not scaling properly, which is strange to me, because it's clearly scaling down from its original size of 8.5x11 inches, but not to 2.4x???... Picture of results attached.

To complicate things further, when I first try to print it in Adobe, it automatically chooses a width of 4 inches, which isn't even possible on this printer...

I don't have an option for continuous roll paper with this driver, it seems, so that is already a bad sign. For Point-of-Sale printers, we recommend users change the page size to the maximum height, and bottom margin paper reduction will generally stop the print job after the data stops, resulting in no extra white space after the text/image.

[Lite Finocchiaro]

I seem to have it working now after setting size to 2.4"w 6"h, ScaleContent true.

I'm not sure why setting the size works for me but not for you, though.

[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Lite,

Ok, so in Pixel Printing on the demo site you set this 2.4" x 6" ?

This is the sample roll that came with the printer, thank you for looking into this and testing this out on your end as well!

https://www.amazon.com/Brother-Genuine-DK-2205-Continuous-Length/dp/B0002VS66W

The only error that I get a notification on is it sometimes shows "Out of Paper" for the reason it's not printing.

I tried "print to file" like you mentioned, please see attached files.  The "check-in-adobe.prn" is the Adobe one that prints properly, and the "check-in-qz-tray.prn" is the QZ Tray output that doesn't print.  I tried opening these files in NotePad++ but I don't know what I'm looking at.

Thank you,

Bernardo

[Bernardo Gago]

Ok, I did some more tests and from my website I was able to finally get it to print; see attached test label samples.  The best print out seemed to be when I left "orientation" blank and used 2.4" x 5". 

It's strange I tested with 2.4" x 4.5",  2.4" x 4.6",  2.4" x 4.7", etc. and nothing worked until I got up to 5".

Even on the one that printed the best with no orientation and set to 2.4" x 5"; I'm not sure why there is so much extra space showing at the end?  Maybe I won't have this same issue when I test this with the 4" x 100' continuous label?

Thank you,

Bernardo

[Bernie]

It's strange on the QZ demo site that 2.4" x 6" with "Scale Content" doesn't seem to be working for me.  These are the settings I have set up:

https://gyazo.com/df4708fed0c96cbe6b3e836e42912f84

Bernardo

[Bernie]

Hi Lite,

So I got my 4" x 100' continuous label roll today and did some more tests, please see attached sample print outs.

With the "adobe-print-dhl_doc-size-4_6.jpg" and "adobe-print-dhl_doc-size-4_8.jpg" files, I printed these directly from Adobe and as you can see they printed out fine.

With the "qztray-print-dhl_doc-size-4_6.jpg", "qztray-print-usps_doc-size-4_6.jpg", and "qztray-print-checkin_doc-size-5_3.jpg", I printed these from my website with QZ Tray; for the most part they didn't print out that bad but noticed the following issues.

1. You can see that the edges seem to get cut off, is there any QZ Tray parameter I can submit to get this to print properly without getting cut off?

2. Regarding the "qztray-print-checkin_doc-size-5_3.jpg" image, I set the QZ Tray W @ 4" x H @ 3" but the actual PDF document size is 5" x 3"; do you think this could be causing issues with this not printing out properly?  Should I have my developer change this so PDF document size gets generated at 4" x "3 to match QT Tray parameter inputs?

3. It seem to work print out the best when I don't include any "orientation" in my QZ Tray request, but why doesn't this work properly when I include portrait or landscape; am I not using this correctly?

4. Regarding the "adobe-print-dhl_doc-size-4_8.jpg", this prints out fine in Adobe, as you can see from the photo, but for some reason I can't get this to print out at all using my website with QZ Tray.  I initially set W @ 4" x H @ 8" but doesn't print anything out.  I then tried changing to 3.9" x 7.9", 4" x 9", 4" x 10", etc. but nothing prints out.  It only seems to print out when I use 4" x 6" but it doesn't print out properly due to the size of the document being 4" x 8"...is there anything else I can try to debug this?

Thank you, again!

Bernie

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Bernie:

This looks like something we've seen before on laserjets when printing from Adobe vs.QZ-Tray.

For QZ-Tray, I would add a margin to all four sides of maybe a quarter inch to achieve a better fitting result. Adobe often does this automatically, scaling down the image just slightly (like 95%) from the original, and therefore not going out to the physical limits of the printer with respect to the media's edge.

Please let me know if this generates an acceptable print. I'll be happy do do whatever testing I can on my 820 if needed.

Regards,

Lite

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[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Lite,

Re.1,2: Ok, so I would need to set up something like this in my printing request @ 0.25 margins; right?

https://qz.io/wiki/pixel#margins

Re.3: Do you have an idea why when actually using "orientation" in a print request it actually prints out worse than if I exclude orientation from the print request?

Re.4: Do you have an idea why the 4"x8" label size isn't printing out at all?

Thank you, again!

Bernie

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Bernardo:

Regarding the margins, yes, that wiki link is correct.

As to why orientation is not honored while "auto" is, I'm afraid I don't know off the top of my head.

Certain drivers just seem to behave differently with flags like orientation. My best guess is that the wide variety of paper sizes supported by this model in combination with the strict firmware regarding what is actually loaded cause the driver to make assumptions about the dimensions, which can be problematic when using continuous rolls.

Regards,

Lite

[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Lite,

Ok, great...I'll have my developer implement the margins in the printing request and see how this works.

Regarding not being able to print out the 4"x8" label with QZ Tray, is there any methods I can use to try to debug this to see why it's not printing?  The 4"x6" label seems to print out fine with QZ Tray but can't seem to get the 4"x8" one to print.

Thank you,

Bernie

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Bernie:

Do you have a picture of the 4x8 results from QZ-Tray? 

At this point, I have put in a support request to Brother because I've run out of ideas. Since I don't have the hardware on hand, I'd like to know if we could do a screenshare with the PC connected to this QL-1110NWB and take a few screenshots; TeamViewer is preferred.

I tried adding a 4x8 option to the driver in Windows 10, but it didn't take, perhaps because my 820NWB is only built for 2.4" wide stock? Screenshots attached.

In case you haven't seen the "Print Server" settings in Windows 10, it's a cool feature that Tres showed me a while back, and it includes every page size for every printer; I have successfully added custom page sizes to other drivers, but the Brother driver doesn't seem to want to pick it up when I try to change printer settings.

Looking forward to your reply,

Lite

[Bernardo Gago]

Hi Lite,

That's the thing, nothing prints out on this QL printer when I try to print a 4x8 with QZ Tray.  The only way I could get the 4x8 label to print properly was directly using Adobe PDF.

Yes, we can definitely set up a screen share, I'm very interested in trying to resolve this printing issue for 4x8 labels; this way I can successfully print these with QZ Tray. 

Please let me know when you're free this week and we can set this up.

Thank you,

Bernie

[Lite Finocchiaro]

Bernie:

I've put the list back on copy.

Thanks for sharing your environment. We discovered that while the maximum height was set to 6 inches in the driver settings, QZ-Tray would not print the 4x8 label with the 4x8 size config.

We changed the driver settings to a maximum height of 8 inches and chose "trim after data," to reduce white space in the event of a shorter label, and QZ-Tray was able to successfully print both the 4x8 label and the 4x6 label to your Brother QL-1110NWB

Cheers,

Lite

On Mon, Jun 14, 2021 at 4:08 PM Bernardo Gago <olim...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Lite,

Ok, sounds good...my cell is 201-248-1512; talk to you then.

Bernardo

On Mon, Jun 14, 2021 at 3:56 PM Lite Finocchiaro <lite.m.fi...@gmail.com> wrote:

Ok. 5:30pm New York time it is.

I personally prefer a phone call, but TeamViewer has PC audio as well if that's easier for you.

My cell:

+1 315 877 7379

Cheers,

Lite

On Mon, Jun 14, 2021 at 12:28 PM Bernardo Gago <olim...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Lite,

I'm available at 5:30pm and we can screen share through TeamViewer.  My Skype username is olimits7 if you want to chat or if you want to talk over the phone I can give you my cell # too.

Thanks,

Bernardo

On Mon, Jun 14, 2021 at 8:47 AM Lite Finocchiaro <lite.m.fi...@gmail.com> wrote:

Bernie:

I'm on New York time, and usually available from 8am to 4pm Monday through Friday, but I'm up late most nights, too. Today I'm free from 11am to 1pm, then again after 3:30pm-late.

I have taken the list off copy and CC'd sup...@qz.io as we're sharing personal information.

Looking forward to your reply.

Regards,

Lite

[Bernie]

Hi Lite,

Thank you for your help troubleshooting this issue, I"m glad we're able to get this to work properly now.  I did some more tests afterwards and everything seems to work fine now.

Thank you,

Bernie