Weird problem with section breaks and printing

[Meginozz]

Hi there, I have a very strange problem happening in a document I'm
trying to print. There is one section of the document that is in
two-
column format, and this is followed by a table that runs over two
pages. When I print the document double-sided, the first page of the
table prints out upside-down! The second page of the table comes out
right way up. It looks fine in print preview and prints fine if I
print it single-sided. The problem is not with the table, as I have
tried adding a page in with normal text on it, and that prints upside
down too. Basically whatever comes on the first page immediately
after the column text section prints upside down!!

I've read up a bit on section breaks and tried different types of
breaks, and also tried adding a column break before the section break
(as the text ends at the end of the first column), but nothing seems
to work.


Any ideas anyone??????

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

One possibility--This sounds like your duplex printer is flipping over
the pages the wrong way, or rather, the way your printer flips pages is
not the way the computer expects it to. Explore all the printer options
in the File | Print dialog--with some printers, you can choose how
duplex printing works--whether it flips the paper on the long edge or
the short edge. If you have a short-edge flipping printer, but the
printer settings say flip on the long edge, you would get upside-down
text on alternate pages.

I'm not totally clear from your question whether you are getting
upside-down text on the *same* page as right-side-up text. If you are,
then the section break *could* account for that within the diagnosis
above, as section breaks often mean the next section of the document is
sent to the printer as a different print job, and thus might be read by
the printer as a different "page" that needs to be reversed. So it's
still worth checking the printer options.

If you can't find a setting, make sure that you are using the exact
printer driver for the printer you have, and check the website for the
printer to see if there is an updated printer.

In general, when Print Preview is correct, but the printed output is
wrong, that points to everything in Word being set up correctly, and
something having gone wrong with the communication between Word and the
printer--which is handled by the printer driver and print options.

 

[Meginozz]

Thanks Daiya, but I forgot to mention that it's ONLY this one page
that prints upside down. And the upside down page comes on a separate
page - the page that gets printed after it flips over. The rest of the
document prints fine, and I don't think it's the printer driver or the
settings, as it was printed by a guy who's been printing out the old
version of this document double-sided for ages and is using all the
same settings. The problem just started when I created this new
document. The two-column section was copied from the old document but
the table I created from scratch. But as I get the same problem if I
just put text on the page after the columns, I don't think it's the
table causing the problem.

I'm 99% certain it's something to do with the section breaks, and from
what you've said, probably to do with the printer seeing it a separate
print job. But I can't figure out what or how to fix it????

Megan

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Huh. No idea. More guesses:

1) you could try deleting and re-creating a fresh section break (perhaps
on a copy of the doc):

2) If it's just this document, you could try the corrupt document fixes
on a copy of the doc:

a) copy the entire thing, *excluding* the last paragraph mark, into a new
document. That last paragraph mark holds a lot of information which can
get corrupted, and copying the text into a document with a fresh one
keeps your formatting, but can fix some glitches. A paragraph mark is a
¶. Click on ¶ on the standard toolbar to show nonprinting characters,
including paragraph marks.

b) the Save as Webpage and Back as described here:
http://www.mvps.org/word/FAQs/AppErrors/CorruptDoc.htm

3) Standard practice in such situations would be to check the website of
the printer manufacturer for an updated printer *driver* (I left that
word out earlier) and install it. The existing driver may have gone
crazy--try reinstalling the printer driver even if a newer one does not
exist.

 

[Meginozz]

Nope.
1) Didn't work.
2) a) Didn't work
b) Deleted lots of useful formatting and didn't work either (the
link you gave mentioned "Save as Web Page" rather than "Save as Web
Page (Filtered) option, but I only had the former to choose from
anyway (am on Word 2003))
3) Haven't tried this as it's happening on more than one computer and
only on this page, so unlikely to be the printer driver and therefore
not grounds to convice the guys it should be reinstalled.

Have emailed it to myself at home and will see what happens to it on
my printer. Spent enough time on this, so if that doesn't produce a
better result will give up, and people will just have to be happy with
a PDF version, which prints out fine.

Thanks for trying Daiya.

 

[Daiya Mitchell]

Sorry. Out of ideas. Maybe someone else?

Nope.
1) Didn't work.
2) a) Didn't work
b) Deleted lots of useful formatting and didn't work either (the
link you gave mentioned "Save as Web Page" rather than "Save as Web
Page (Filtered) option, but I only had the former to choose from
anyway (am on Word 2003))
3) Haven't tried this as it's happening on more than one computer and
only on this page, so unlikely to be the printer driver and therefore
not grounds to convice the guys it should be reinstalled.

Have emailed it to myself at home and will see what happens to it on
my printer. Spent enough time on this, so if that doesn't produce a
better result will give up, and people will just have to be happy with
a PDF version, which prints out fine.

Thanks for trying Daiya.