Printing Different Things

(Please bear in mind that menu boxes and instructions will vary in their appearance from one computer to another.)

Most people simply use A4 sheets of paper when printing anything on their computer and don’t realise that many other variations of printed output can be done from almost all home printers.

If you go to "File – Page Set Up – Paper Size – Paper Size" and click on the Drop Down Box you will see a wealth of different pre set sizes available. The sizes include, A4, A5, A6, typical Index Card Sizes, Standard Photo and Envelope Sizes as well as Custom sizes that you can set for specialist print jobs.

If you are writing a short letter to someone it often looks a little odd if you print it on a large A4 sheet and in the good old days of letter writing all letter pads were actually about A5 size. There is no reason why you can’t print your letters on A5 on your computer by simply changing the size of paper as above.

Packs of A5 can be horrendously expensive to buy unless you can find an office supplies shop that will cut a standard A4 pack in half for you, often free of charge. (You will of course get 1,000 sheets of A5 in your pack then instead of 500 A4!) Of course with cheap modern home guillotines you could simply cut a few A4 pages down yourself.

A5 sheets can be used for other small print jobs such as Flyers advertising lost dogs/cats, local fetes, charity events, etc.

When printing don’t forget that you can easily set the printer (On Page Set Up ) to print the page sideways by selecting "Orientation – Landscape, or Portrait" for normal. You can easily print Photos from your files or take them from your camera, save them, and then print them. Quality will not be too good as regards durability, etc, on normal paper, but many home printers can also use special ink cartridges and high quality paper for printing photos that will then be as good as you get from a commercial photo developers.

It has to be said that, especially with envelopes, some printers will handle different print sizes better than others. Of course when printing envelopes you have to make sure that they are inserted the correct way round and right way up and this will be different with different printers. Also be warned that many self-adhesive envelopes can jam up printers if the adhesive part of the envelope sticks in the printer.

To use the pre-set options for envelopes go to "Tools – Envelopes & Labels." This will open up a small window that gives many simple features enabling easy control over the layout of print on an envelope. A delivery address can be typed in as can a return address, or they can be added with a click from your "Address book" as used in your E-mails. The "Options" control allows changes to be made to the envelope size and Fonts. Also the addresses can be inset from the left and the top. The small pre-view window gives an idea of what the envelope will look like when printed. The final envelope can be added to a word document and saved for future reference.

Labels can be printed in much the same way as addressing envelopes, but you also have other options. Select "Labels" at the top of the first "Envelopes/Labels" menu box and then firstly you can set, via the Radio Button at the bottom left, the computer to print a full page of the same label after designing just one. You can of course change the label sizes to match any sheets of labels that you can buy. Simply click on the label picture on the bottom left of the first labels menu box. The screen will then show a small menu box as per illustration. The label products and product number should be given on the pack of labels that you have bought. Clicking on the "Details" button on the right will open up a very complicated menu settings box (1st picture) that most people won’t want to bother with. From the first label Menu box it is possible to set the computer to print on odd labels on partly used sheet of labels. Instead of clicking on "Full Page" select "Single Label" which will then activate the "Row" and "Column" controls enabling you to select individual label positions on a sheet.

What might be of interest to a lot of people is that selecting the "Business card" option (as highlighted on the label options picture) is an easy way to make and print a few standard size business cards to your own design with no expense. A whole sheet can be printed (on light card, around 200-250 gram) as for labels and then guillotined.

After selecting business cards, click Ok, which will then return you to the main Envelopes and Labels menu box. Then simply click on "New Document" and a whole page will open up pre-set into business card sized cells and using normal "Word" editing facilities you can fill the cells with your design, containing whatever combination of text and pictures that you want. You don’t have to use the pre-set business card size as it will work just as well with any labels setting. Also there is a pre-set option for printing post card sizes with 4 cards to a sheet of A4 card.