# Printing to Agfa imagesetter, OS X 10.3.9 to 10.6.4 upgrade



## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Has anyone configured 10.6.4 to print to an imagesetter? 

Just migrated from a 5 year old mini running 10.3.9 512mb of ram, 40gig hd to a new mac mini running 10.6.4. 8gigs of ram, & 500gb hd. Now I have to setup printing to the rip, I have gotten all of the network printers to work, ( 5 in total ), just having a long day now that I have to figure out how to print to an old Agfa Imagesetter. 

Oh ya... and the software that they are using for design is Quark 6.5 & Indesign CS2. Both programs are working away just fine. No hick-ups, no font issues like in the 10.6.3 version that I was dreading.

Any comments or help would be much appreciated.


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## bsenka (Jan 27, 2009)

What do you do that you still need an imagesetter? I think it's been at least four years since we've even had a request for film output of any kind.


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

I work for a small town printshop. Everything that is output is to film.


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## Dammacx (May 22, 2006)

Hey macpablodesigns,

You should probably keep that mac mini hooked up. You will probably have to print through it via shared printers from your new Leopard computer. That is what I had to do here at work when I upgraded my iMac. Since Apple killed Appletalk support you probably won't be able to even see your imagesetter on the network. I am assuming it used Appletalk.

BTW we still need to send out for film here also since we run some small 2 color AB Dicks at our shop.


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## macuserforlife (Oct 30, 2004)

Dammacx said:


> You should probably keep that mac mini hooked up.


This is good advice. We've been printing to our CTP through a G5 Quad running Leopard ever since the 10.6 upgrade took out Appletalk.

I don't even mind it because it gives us a little redundancy no matter which way we go (new or used) with our future CTP needs.

With a new press coming this year, we'll need a new CTP also but, like others have already said, we'll keep running our two colour AB Dicks and, therefore, still need an Appletalk friendly output device.


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## wonderings (Jun 10, 2003)

Film still? I am so thankfully we moved to a presstek dimension ctp. No more chemicals! 

Are you able to just drop a PS file into a hot folder? Not as simple as printing to it, but might allow you to work with any version of OS X.


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

I managed to get it working without using the old mini as a print-server (it died a couple days after I put the new one in) Direct to RIP printing now works.


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## Dammacx (May 22, 2006)

macpablodesigns said:


> I managed to get it working without using the old mini as a print-server (it died a couple days after I put the new one in) Direct to RIP printing now works.


How did you manage that? Details man details.


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## bsenka (Jan 27, 2009)

wonderings said:


> Film still? I am so thankfully we moved to a presstek dimension ctp. No more chemicals! .


That's why I asked. We moved to CTP about ten years ago, stopped even offering film about 7 years ago, and haven't even heard a request for it in 4 or 5 years.


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Once I get all my notes in order, I will have a post on how, what, and links to the agfa ppds that I found that seem to be working just fine in 10.6.4.


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

*Solution?*

Hi. Would you be able to share how you managed it? We have a very similar setup here and I cannot even get the OS X 10.6 iMacs to see the Viper RIP!


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Is the Viper rip running through Windows? if so is it Xp or 2000? and what imagesetter are you guys using? Agfa?


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

It is Viper 3.0 on Mac OS 8.6 with an AGFA SelectSet 7000 and an AGFA AccuSet 1000. Everything was working fine when we were using a PowerMac G4 running OS X 10.3 connected over the network. Unfortunately the PowerMac died and nobody remembers who, how or when it was set up. I had no joy using the "Interweb Google Machine" either. I can't even find out how to set up OS X 10.3, let alone 10.6!


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Here are the ppds for the Agfa imagesetters Adobe - PostScript printer drivers : For Macintosh : PPD Files: Agfa : Thank You you will probably need the AGFA AccuSet 1000-X or the AGFA AccuSet 1000W-X for the AccuSet 1000, but you may have to check if you have PS3 installed on the Rip, as for the SelectSet 7000 you may need to use the SelectSet 7000-X driver; these ones are the ones that the Viper rip uses.

Who would have known that they would have been on Adobe's site and not on Agfa's. We have been using these with 10.6.4 & 10.4.9 with no problems.

How to set up printing to rip with Windows host Rip http://rti-rips.com/LinkedDocuments/Version7Instructions/SharingPrinterWindowsRIP.pdf

How to set up printing to rip from Mac host rip http://rti-rips.com/LinkedDocuments/Version7Instructions/TCP-IP Socket Input.pdf

Here is the link to the page where I found the info RTI Harlequin RIP Technical Support - RTI Harlequin RIP Software Support PPD Download Tutorials

Hope that this will help others.


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

Thank you so much for your help so far. We have made progress…

We correctly "installed" the PPDs on one of the OS X 10.6 Intel iMacs from:

Adobe - PostScript printer drivers : For Macintosh : PPD Files: Agfa : Thank You

using the instructions at:

http://rti-rips.com/LinkedDocuments/Version7Instructions/TCP-IP Socket Input.pdf

With no success. However, we did notice that the RIP had an unusual IP address - 162.198.200.10 - that did not seem to correspond to anything else on the network. Additionally, none of the OS X computers could see it or even Ping it, but the OS 9 PowerMac G4 could print to it.

In order to eliminate potential causes we manually assigned the RIP an IP address that is in the same subnet as the other computers and RIPs - 10.0.0.101 (eg. we have a Xerox RIP at 10.0.0.200).

Now all the OS X machines can Ping it and the OS 9 PowerMac G4 can still print to it. A partial success!

However, we have tried different PPDs - AccuSet 1000 X, W-X, A, W-A - and get the same error message every time:

Connecting to printer…
Network host '10.0.0.101' is busy; will retry in 10 seconds…

It keeps retrying without success.

The OS X iMacs did not automatically see either the Xerox or AGFAs when setting up the printers but they do successfully print to the Xerox.

Please help with any further suggestions?


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

I was just looking and the 162.198.200.10 address is not a lan address if it is in your local network it should be in the 10.0.0.0 - 10.255.255.255
172.16.0.0 - 172.31.255.255
192.168.0.0 - 192.168.255.255
I am not sure if it is on the other side of a switch/router on a different subnet of the other network, also check to see if is on the same subnet mask - 255.255.255.0 or something like that.

But then again it has been a very long week already, and its only Wednesday


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

Yes, the I.P. certainly confused me but we resolved that by changing it to something within 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255. Which means that all the OS X 10.6 Macs can now at least Ping to the Viper RIP.

However we now have the new issue of the error message "Network host '10.0.0.101' is busy". It seems we've made some great progress but can you think of anything we might still be missing?

Your help so far has been GREATLY appreciated, by the way.


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

When you installed the printer on 10.6, did you set up for LDP printing? It's in the ip section of the printer control panel


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

Yes, LPD. Then we entered the correct I.P. address and the correct PPD (we tried several, actually).

We followed the same pattern for the Xerox setup and it worked. But with the AGFA we now keep getting this message. It is a big leap forward from not even seeing the RIP though!

AGFA's "solution" is to spend a year's salary on a new RIP. They wouldn't offer any other suggestion. But if it's TCP/IP and we have the right PPDs why shouldn't it work?!


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Give me a day or two, I am in the middle of two magazines to be printed by Monday, so i'll have a look and see if I can find out any more info.


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## macpablodesigns (Jun 11, 2010)

Just wondering if you had checked ‘Publish as Printer’ when setting up the input on the rip, you may have to check to see if share printer is checked in the control panel. can you try and ping the printer again but include the port number that you would have assigned during the tcp/ip input socket setup on the rip.


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## RussellNewton (Oct 5, 2010)

Thanks macpablodesigns! Much appreciated.


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