Deskjet 6540 not recognizing ph5712 Duplexer installation [ Edited ]

[oliaseleven]

Hello

Problem summary: I bought a ph5712 duplexer to work with my Deskjet 6540. Deskjets 65xx are listed as compatible on the ph5712 box. The printer and my operating system (Windows 7 RC1 x64) doesn't seem to acknowledge the presence of the duplexer, even when I manually set the Duplexer Installed parameter in the Printer Properties found in Control Panel>Devices & Printers from Not Installed to Installed status. The duplexer is compatible with my printer but it seems to be invisible to both my printer and OS. Below is a longer explaination of what I have done so far.

I have a Deskjet 6540 that has always worked great. I recently bought a ph5712 duplexer. The duplexer was installed quickly and I immediately attempted duplex printing in Win7 x64 RC1 using a multipage document in Word 2007 SP2. To print I clicked on Print, then went into Properties, and selected Duplex Printing from the drop down box. In the same window below the drop down box I then went to change the 2-Sided Printing setting from Manual to Automatic, but Automatic was not available. The document then printed with manual duplexing.The printer driver was clearly not aware of the duplexer.

So I went into Devices & Printers, right clicked on Deskjet 6540, selected Printer Properties, clicked on the Device Settings tab. Under the Installable Options heading, I saw that Duplex Unit was set to Not Installed. I changed it to Installed and tried the above printing method again.This time, automatic was available to select for 2-sided printing. Upon printing, I received an error message saying that the printer did not have a duplexer installed and offered to print with manual duplex printing. I canceled and powered down the printer to check the connection between the duplexer and the printer. 

I pulled the duplexer out of the back of the printer to check to see if the electrical interface on the duplexer that connects to the printer had tape on it or something to protect it during shipping. I did this with the understanding that if there's not a successful connection between the duplexer and the printer then the printer and OS wouldn't know the duplexer was installed. There was no tape, the connection was fine and appearred to be complete. However I noticed that the duplexer had 4 points of contact while the printer only had two, suggesting perhaps that the duplexer is not made to interface with this printer. However, I realize that this duplexer is designed for several different models of printers, so perhaps this particular printer model only uses the two points of contact. The duplexer box specifically says it is compatable with Deskjet 65xx printers, yet I cannot get the printer (or perhaps Win 7) to aknowledge that the duplexer is installed. Was an improper interface installed on my DJ 6540? I can supply pictures if this is helpful.

I tried the printing method again, this time with Adobe Reader 9.0.1 as well to no avail. Again, the Automatic option was not available for the 2-Sided Printing option. I went back to the Printer Properties found under Control Panel>Devices & Printers, and this time it would not let me change Duplexer Installed from Not Installed to Installed. Is there a driver issue?

Any recommendations? The printer otherwise works fine in Win 7, and has always worked in Vista x64 and XP. This is the first time I have ever had problems with it.

EDIT: Added some info.

EDIT: Revised for clarity.

EDIT: It would appear that every time I change Duplex Installed to from Not Installed to Installed, then go to print in a program, select Properties, and select Duplex Printing from the drop down box, Duplex Installed changes automatically from Installed back to Not Installed. This suggests to me that the printer driver is communicating with the printer, and the printer responds that the duplexer is not installed. So it looks like the root of the problem is that the printer or the printer driver is not recognizing the duplexer. Is there a utility available that will let me talk to the firmware to see whether it's the printer or the printer driver that thinks the duplexer isn't installed? And is there any way for me to tell if the duplexer is DOA (dead on arrival, a defective unit)?

System specs:

Win 7 x64 RC1

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9660

Gigabyte  EP35C-DS3R mainboard, Intel P35 chipset

4GB RAM

ATI Radeon 4850

2x500GB Onboard Intel RAID 0, 2x1TB WD, 1x750GB Seagate.

Creative X-Fi Fataility PCI

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-14-2009 09:00 AM

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-14-2009 05:35 PM

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-14-2009 05:58 PM

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-14-2009 06:09 PM

[oliaseleven]

The 6540's users manual explains that (in XP) you need to go into the printer application that came on the driver cd and check some boxes for duplexer installed and auto duplex printing. However this application isn't offered in Vista or Win 7 flavors on the HP website, so it looks like my duplexer is just an expensive paperweight until HP decides to offer Win 7 support. It's not likely that will even fix my problem since they still don't offer this app for Vista. Looks like its time to call customer service.

User's manual (see Fig 16): http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=115&prodSeriesId=357210&prodTypeId=18972&objectID=c00189770#A9

If I could get a Vista version of the app I should be able to install it in Win 7 using this method: http://h30434.www3.hp.com/psg/board/message?board.id=win7Beta&thread.id=148&jump=true

Unfortunately the Printer Diagnostic Utility, the only app offered for download for the 6540, has a download error from the server saying the file doesn't exist: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=357212&prodTypeId=18972&prodSeriesId=357210&swLang=8&taskId=135&swEnvOID=2098

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-16-2009 09:18 PM

[oliaseleven · Accepted solution]

A phone call with HP tech support cleared things up. It turns out that the only printer they currently have that is "compatible with Windows 7" is the Photosmart C4700, and automatic duplex printing doesn't work on it even though it has a duplexer and it's allegedly "compatible". So essentially HP suggested that I buy a new printer so, get this, I can still not have automatic duplex printing. Pure genius on their part. They were nice enough, but their support people were predictably as impotent as any other I've encountered. I have a feeling that when Win 7 is released to the general public next month that their Win 7 drivers will allow this duplexer to work as it should. I can only hope, of course, since it's too late to return it.

Message Edited by oliaseleven on 09-19-2009 10:36 PM