Mac Printing extremely slow to start, as if on a delay

[gcc0415]

A problem which occurs for some Macs in my house but not all, is that when a doc is set to print, it can take minutes or honestly hours for it to emerge from the printer. The printer is connected via USB. The cable has been replaced and different ports on the mac have been tried. The print dialog and the print queue shows the job is underway, but it takes anywhere from minutes to hours before the printer decides to start printing. The printer prints quickly once it gets going. We've deleted the printer from the Print & Scan preferences, reset the printer system. Any ideas?

[X-23]

Hello @gcc0415,

Welcome to the HP Support Forums!

I understand that you're experiencing a slow printing issue when printing from your Mac OS X 10.8 computers to your USB connected HP Photosmart C4680 All-in-One Printer. I would like to assist you today with resolving this printing speed issue. I do also want to thank you for including the troubleshooting steps you have already attempted prior to reaching out for support. Due to the age of your HP Photosmart HP didn't release a downloadable Full Feature Software and Driver package for your model of printer on the Mac OS X 10.8 Operating System. The last Full Feature driver that was released was for the Mac OS X 10.7 Operating System. Therefore, we are relying solely on the HP Driver package from Apple to install and function properly through the Apple Updates. There is a chance that this driver package may not have installed correctly, or may have experienced a conflict with a recent Apple Update that ran. Therefore, to resolve this print speed issue I am going to run you through some standard Mac troubleshooting steps below.

Step 1: Reset Print System and Uninstall:

I see that you have already attempted to Reset the Print System on your Mac to no avail. For troubleshooting purposes it is crucial that we have a nice clean slate to work with. Therefore, I will be having you Reset the Print System one more time, with some added Uninstall steps. Please click here to access the Reset and Uninstall instructions. Once the support document opens select the dropdown for 'Mac OS X v10.6, OS X v10.7, OS X v10.8, and OS X v10.9'. Please run through Method One and Method Two.

Once the Reset and Uninstall are complete, please proceed to the next step.

Step 2: Verify and Repair your Disk Permissions on the Mac:

1. Open Macintosh HD and go to Applications
2. Go to the Utilities Folder
3. Open the Disk Utility
4. Select the Hard Drive volume you are using (usually on the left)
5. Select Verify Disk Permissions
6. Once that process is done, select Repair Disk Permissions

Step 3: Manually install Driver Package:

Please click here to manually download the Apple Update package for HP Printer Drivers v3.0. Once the website opens select the Download button at the top. Follow the onscreen instructions to install the driver package.

Step 4: Check for Apple Updates:

1. Go to Apple
2. Select System Preferences
3. Select Software Update
4. Click Update Now
5. Install your available updates
6. Restart your computer

Step 5: Add the Device:

1. Click the Apple menu, and then click System Preferences.

2. Click Print & Scan, and then check if the name of your printer displays in the Printers list.

3. Click the name of your printer, click the minus sign (), and then delete the printer. 

4. Click the plus sign (), click Add Printer or Scanner, click the name of your printer,

5. Click the Use or Print Using box, and then select the name of your printer in the pop-up menu. Ensure that the Photosmart driver is selected.

6. Click Add to add the printer to the list.

- Source

Once your printer is successfully added in please test printing again to verify if the printing speeds have been improved.

Please respond to this post with the result of your troubleshooting. I look forward to hearing from you! 🙂

[MacFish]

This worked!!  Instead of waiting 33 minutes for a JPG schematic to print out, it took less than a minute.  I've had no problems printing text using Preview, any text editor, and Libre Office.  It's only with graphics such as JPGs.

I'm using El Cap 10.11.6 on a Mid 2010 Mac Mini 2.4 Ghz Core 2 Duo with 8 GB of RAM

When the Add screen came up for adding a printer, the system identified the connected printer.  I then clicked on the Use list button and selected the Generic PCL drivers.  I'm going to try the other selections to see how they work. 

So far, I'm a happy camper!!!

The question comes down to why I do not have this problem with a PC but only with an older HP printer on older Mac hardware?  I can quess the answer but it is frustrating but understandable.  Thanks for the help HP Support!!

[Oa1]

Mac printing extremely low with HP 4525 Laser.Is there a driver for Mac OS Sierra 10.12.1.

Thnak you,

My situation is exactly as described by previous user.

Thank you

[MacFish]

I recently retired my HP 1320 and purchased a HP MPF227fdw.  The difference in print speed between the two is like night and day.  Once started, the MPF227 took 1 minute and 10 seconds to print 3 copies of an 8 page duplexed report with a rotated 90 degree spreadsheet and a rotated graph.  The whole process took less than two minutes with the MPF227. 

With the HP1320, the same report took a l-o-n-g  time to format it for printing.  I could easily to see each pair of duplex pages being translated to PCL (forget using the Postscript driver) and then have it print slowly, followed by the next pair of pages.  After the first report was printed, the whole process started all over again.  It took around 40 minutes to print those reports.

With the MPF227, it is like the computer translates the first report and then from an internal print file, the other two are printed without the long delays.  My HP1320 was manufactured on July 21, 2005.  However, when this printer was hooked up to a Windows based system, the printing was a lot faster.

I've used the scanner and copy functions and love the speed and clarity of output.