All, I have a strange situation that I cannot figure out.
When printing to an HP LaserJet 3550N printer via CUPS/Samba on a Sarge box _from_ a Windows XP box the bandwidth and CPU usage on the client (XP) machine is insane. The network usage applet (on the XP machine) will typically show 25% usage (100mbit LAN) and 100% CPU usage for 5-6 minutes and the XP box will basically freeze during that time. In contrast, when I print directly to the printer from Windows (it's a network printer) via a standard TCP/IP port, this doesn't happen. CPU usage might spike to 10% for 10-15 seconds or so, and network usage might register 25% for a few moments. In both operations I use the print drivers supplied by HP for this model printer. The easy solution is just to ditch CUPS for my printing, but I really like being able to go back and restart jobs regardless of which machine I'm currently using. I have quite a few documents that are printed regularly, and being able to sit down at any machine and restart the job via a web browser is very handy. I also have an HP LaserJet 4000N (black/white) printer on the network, and printing to it via CUPS also results in the same scenario, but not quite as pronounced. Also, it doesn't matter what program I am printing from, be it Photoshop, Acrobat, Word, Excel (although Excel is the worst) attempting to print from any of these applications gives the same insane CPU/Network usage. The print jobs always end up being printed but, needless to say, having to wait 5 mins between clicking print and my XP box "unfreezing" is not something I can live with. Anyone have some insight into this? Maybe you experienced something similar and can give me a few tips on how to resolve it? Thanks in advance!
