Excel not loading defaults/preferences for printer when switching to other printer with same driver

Question

Hi all,

Recently I encountered an issue with excel and I am unable to find a solution.

Within the setup here, we created multiple printers with different defaults.

This is done so users can select a printer that will use a certain tray, without being bothered by the printer settings.

For the users, this works well within word and several other programs.

Now I found an issue with excel (using 2016 and 2010 on multiple W10 machines).

When selecting a printer with certain tray settings these settings are loaded as intended.

When switching to an other printer that uses the same driver, the settings are retained.

If a printer is selected that uses a different driver, and then re-select the correct printer, the printer defaults are now loaded correctly.

When doing the same test within Word or PowerPoint, this does not happen.

When testing with different drivers, I was able to observe identical behaviour, regardless of the driver used (HP, Ricoh, Canon).

Is this in any way known behavior for Excel, or is there any solution to ensure Excel is forced to load the printer defaults when selecting a printer?

Regards,

Jasper.

Answer 1

Hi Jasper,

Glad to know the preference for printer loaded when you created shorter printer name.

As mentioned in the above article, Windows DevMode is limited by design, so there isn’t any other workaround apart from shortening the printer name.

Regards,

Neha

Answer 2

Hi Jasper,

Are you using Windows DedMode? Windows DevMode has a limitation of 32 characters. When Excel queries the printers, it is given the printer name information from Windows. Windows DevMode is limited by design and will truncate the name after 31 characters. This information is then passed to Excel which caches the information for faster performance when printing. If the names are identical after they are truncated, Excel will not query the printer for new settings and the cached settings will be used.

Please check the following article for detailed information and workaround: Excel print settings do not change when switching printers

Thanks,

Neha

Answer 3

Hi Jasper,

Did you check the above reply? Let us know if you still need help.

Regards,

Neha

Answer 4

Hi Neha,

First, thanks for your quick reply.

I am not aware that we are using DevMode on our machines, but the article you linked to, describes the issue into exact detail.

Therefore I assume excel does use this in the background.

When testing, I did not test a short name, resulting in the identifier for the printer to fall beyond the 31/32 character mark.

When I created a printer name that was shorter, the defaults loaded without any issues.

Are you aware of any way, (besides the ones mentioned in the article), to work around this?

For now, we will be renaming the printers with a long name.

Thanks again for the quick reply!

Regards,

Jasper.