it’s all about using the right cassette

A familiar problem

You have five printers and two multifunctionals in your office. Some only have two paper cassettes, others have as many as five. All these cassettes contain a bewildering mix paper types: A4 and A3, bond and copy quality, headed and plain. When you want to use a specific paper type, how do you know which cassette it’s in - especially if you have to use a printer you’re not familiar with?

The solution

Technology can help - and it’s not even complicated!
All you have to do is make sure the printers and multifunctionals know what sort of paper they have in their cassettes, then users only have to tell the printer to use a certain paper type and the printer picks it from the correct cassette.
Registering paper types is done differently on different machines so we can’t provide ‘one size fits all’ instructions. However, we can tell you that the process is usually:
 - Access the printer or multifunctional’s setup menu
 - Select paper settings
 - Select the cassette (e.g. cassette 1 or multi-purpose tray)
 - Specify the paper size (e.g. A4 or A3)
 - Specify the paper type (e.g. bond, plain or headed)

In action

The paper or cassette options are used to specify which paper type is stored in which cassette.
Control panels and menus differ from machine to machine, although all but the most basic printers have them.

Simple paper selection

With paper types assigned to specific trays, users never again have to think about which cassette contains the paper they want to use.
All they have to do is select the paper type they want to use and leave the printer to pick it from the correct cassette.

In action

Users only have to select the paper type they want to use in their printer driver.
The printer knows which cassette contains that paper type and selects it automatically.

Label the paper cassettes

Once specific paper types have been assigned to specific trays, it’s a good idea to put an appropriate label on the outside of the cassettes. This ensures that users always load the correct paper type.
After all, if you load plain A3 paper into the cassette that’s meant to hold headed A4, you won’t get the documents you expect!