I’m having problems printing in Finale, what should I do?
If you are having printing problems, here are some things to try.
Increase Finale’s memory.
1.Quit Finale.
2.Go to the Finder and open the Finale folder.
3.Click on Finale so it is highlighted.
4.Go to the File menu and select Get Info>Memory. You will see a dialog box with info about Finale.
5.You’ll see a Memory Requirements section. Increase the Preferred Size by 5000 K and the Minimum Size by 3000 K. (These numbers can be set higher if need be) This will give Finale more memory to work with.
6.Close the info dialog box.
7.Restart Finale and try printing again:
To test printing…
*Go to the File Menu and Choose New>Document Without Libraries (aka “Empty”).
*From the File menu, choose “Print…” (and click Print).
If you still get the error try…
Trashing the Finale Preferences:
1.Quit Finale.
2.Locate on your Hard Drive>System Folder>Preferences>Finale Preferences.
3.Drag the file “Finale Preferences” to the trash can and empty it.
4.Start Finale and try again to print the Document Without Libraries.
Other common fixes:
*Print only one page of your document (tests to see if it’s a memory error).
*Print with the suspect fonts in ANOTHER application, such as a word processor (tests to see if the font on your system is corrupt).
*Cycle the power on the printer and print (tests to see if the cached version of the PS font on the printer has gotten corrupt).
*Figure out “what’s changed” on your system since it worked last … if it worked before … and examine carefully what happened and why the error is occurring now, if it didn’t before … this INCLUDES SIMPLY RESTARTING.
*Try the document in question on a different printer (tests to see if the hardware is at fault)
*Reinstall the fonts. (Perform a custom installation of only the fonts from your original CD.)
*Test for an extension conflict. (
*Go to your printer manufacturer’s web site and look for the latest version of the driver for your printer.
*If you have the latest driver for your printer and it’s still not working, go to the manufacturer’s website and download the printer drivers for similar models. Sometimes they work better. Really.
Post Script Printers only:
*In the Printer PostScript Options dialog (File Menu>Page Setup), uncheck “Font Substitution” and “Unlimited Downloadable Fonts” (generally helps PS files print).
*Save as PostScript file (File>Compile Post Script Listing) and drag that to a desktop printer (generally is a helpful workaround since this bypasses the Finale application completely).
*Try printing from pages other than the first. See if you can narrow it down to a specific page. Sometimes PostScript errors are caused by things like slurs across a page break.
*If that doesn’t work, it may be a corrupted expression that is causing the problem.
*Save a copy of the file with a different name.
*Click on the MassMover tool and choose Select All from the Edit menu.
*From the MassMover menu choose Clear.
*Click on Only Selected Items, click on Measures, put a check on Measure Expressions and click OK.
*Now, click on Entries, click on Only Selected Items, click on Note expressions, click OK and then OK again.
*Try to print the piece. If it prints, go to the File menu and choose revert. Erase the expressions for 1/2 of the piece. See if the file prints. If it doesn’t, erase the other half. In this manner narrow the search until you can target a specific measure. Delete the expression from the score and re-create it.
*Try a similar thing with Smart Shapes (truly could help, even if by this point you’re looking at your watch).
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