Interesting issue with the MX-3051 PCL6 driver

[rspicer]

It's interesting what clicking 1 check box will do. I had a lot more hair before I started dealing with software issues.
So, a customer just bought an MX-3051. It's a civil engineering firm that prints a lot of 11x17 drawings in .pdf format. They use a combination of Acrobat and another software package (I don't know the name) to view, edit and print the drawings. When printing drawings, if they manually set the paper size to 11x17 in the print window, the machine prints the image shifted left and down on the page by more than an inch, causing 2 sides of the image to be off the page. If they click on the Auto Paper Size check box, the image is beautifully centered. It's not really a problem, since we figured out how to print them properly, but why is there a difference between manually choosing 11x17 and letting it automatically choose 11x17 based on the document size? It doesn't make sense to me. Would the PS driver work better?

[Prints Charming]

Re: Interesting issue with the MX-3051 PCL6 driver

Strange a civil engineering firm chooses an entry-level 600dpi, optional PostScript printer. They would have better print results with the next models up in the Sharp MX range which are 1200dpi and have genuine PS3 built-in, especially on those engineering drawings with fine lines and often cases of layering & transparency issues in the PDF.
Firstly, find out the true size of the document being printed. Open a PDF, in File / Properties, you will see a Page Size mentioned. This is the sheet size of the document.
Adobe has options in the Print Dialog Box for Fit, Actual Size, Shrink Oversized, Scaling and Choose Paper Source by PDF Page Size. It is best practice to select Fit as other options tend to over-ride the print driver settings I've found.
Of course, you use Actual Size when printing a document to match XY dimensions, such as a label sheet or a custom size sheet, but for everything else choose Fit, as this will allow the MFD Tray settings and Print Driver settings to work correctly together.

From how I read your post, it seems the document sheet size is not actually 11x17 measurements, then you're choosing 11x17 paper size to use by default for this job, and the document subsequently prints well off-center.

I don't think the PS driver will make any difference here. You'd need the optional PS Kit installed on the MX3051 to start with. This appears more like a clash between document sheet size and Adobe/Driver settings.

[rspicer]

Re: Interesting issue with the MX-3051 PCL6 driver

The document is actually 11x17. I checked.
They were more concerned with buying the cheapest machine we had in stock rather than paying more for quality.