Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

I have been having a problem with Qimage being slow with certain functions since upgrading to Windows 7 (64 bit) last November. I never had this problem with Qimage under Vista 64 bit. Some of these problems may be with the Epson driver, but not all of them. When I delete an image that is in the print queue it takes a long time to complete the delete. When I click on the printer properties icon to bring up the Epson driver window it takes a really long time. If anyone has some suggestions as to what may be the problem I would appreciate hearing from you. I have 12 GB of memory and an I7 CPU. None of my other applications have slowed down noticeably since moving to Windows 7. I only print to my Epson printers with Qimage so I can't say if I would experience these issues with Photoshop, but maybe I should test that out.  I can't envision myself printing photos outside of Qimage because I like the application so much and have been using it for a number of years.

Thanks, Andy

Andy,
I know of others who say Qimage goes faster on W7 64 so it sounds like a system problem of some sort. Mike uses W7 64, so it must be ok.  ;)
Have you checked task manger to see what else is going on, other programs and services? There are some widgets that allow you to see the CPU and core usage as things are running.

Terry
PS. are the images on a network drive of is the printer a network printer?

Andy,
I run 64 bit W7, and it has a peculiar way of starting.
It appears to boot rapidly but underneath the surface, stuff ir sorting and loading and running for close to 6 minutes before it calms down.
In the side bar, I keep a CPU monitor that they offer as a "toy" .
Watching that, showing 4 cores of the quad core in operation you can actually see how busy the nachine is during that first 5-10 minutes.

If you have this slowdown after 10 minutes, then follow Terry's advice and use Task Manager and the processes tab abd check the % of CPU being used and by what.

Fred

The printer and computer is not on a network. I am plugged into a router but have turned sharing off on my Epson printers. Next time I use Qimage I will turn on task manager and watch resources when I try to do a delete or bring up printer properties. I don't think resources will be an issue but I will check it again.

It is not a case of sufficient resources, but a matter of sharing processor time and power.

Is there a way I can permanently give Qimage and the Epson driver highest priority?

Just wait the 10 minutes for W7 to load all that you have set to load.
After that, any app you run will have the priority.

Check to see if you have your antivirus set to check the computer every time you boot the computer.
Many people have that feature on (sometimes by default) and that take a long time to complete.
Sometimes, the AV program is set to scan any file that is being moved within the computer. That can slow it down.
If you have a new camera, and the file size that it is creating might be enormous, in the 20-25 MB range, that can make Qimage and the printer driver appear slow.
Lots of things to consider.

Fred

I just started Qimage after a reboot and a 20 minute wait after it was at the desktop. I went into task manager and set some of the processes and services I thought might be related to high priority, instead of the default normal. I tried recalling a job, deleting an image from the job, and bringing up the Epson driver properties window.  When I first recalled the job, for about 15 seconds or more, task manager said Qimage was not responding. Is that normal? The services and processes I set to a high priority included Qimage, Epson bidirectional, and SpoolSv. When I bring up the Epson print properties window from Qimage I get a second Qimage window in the task bar and both say not responding for at least 30 seconds, as does task manager. Deleting an image from the job seems a little faster but still takes about 10 seconds. CPU usage was between 3% and 20%.  Is that normal? Does the size of the image matter (in the Qimage print queue the average size of the four images is 275 mb).

Anyway to set high priority on all processes and services related to Qimage and the print driver / spooler permanently?

Andy

My 8 bit Tif files after Photoshop processing generally range from 25mb - 80mb. Most are between 50 - 80mb.

You are going to need an answer from someone better versed in Windows operation than I.
Those are large files and may load into a high rez screen slowly but recovering a saved job should not be a problem unless the saved images were stored thru a network on a different machine or server?
Best I can offer.
The Qimage not responding is a common (Not responding message) is a Windows time out thing. I can get that from many apps including Acronis back up and other high intensity apps when they take long to initialize and load the needed files. Waiting another minute allows the app to work and windows stops sending that error message.

Fred

I found a free application called Prio that enhances the task manager priority options and lets you save a priority for a process so next time you boot or the process is started it will remember the priority. By setting the priority to high on Qimage and the Epson driver processes it seems to have helped with the limited printing I have done since.

Andy