FastSpool+

It all began because I was getting irritated! Let me explain. Usually, I produce single sheets of work which are then photocopied, but just recently I have found myself with runs of several pages needing to be printed several times, and the unproductive wait to get the screen and keyboard back was getting to be too much. So I began to think about a print spooler and looked through Archive for some reviews. No reviews - just a request from Paul to do one on FastSpool+. So there we were and here we go.

FastSpool+

FastSpool+ is a commercial development of Andreas Dehmel's PD FastSpool by Warm Silence Software. They have added integration with !Printers, support of more printers, network spooler facilities and generally speeded up return of control to the user.

Installation

FastSpool+ arrives on an 800Kb disc. There are good, clear instructions and the installation was easy. On a RiscPC, this involved copying the !FastSpl+ application into !Boot.Choices.Boot.Tasks and the FastSpool+ Obey file into !Boot.Choices.Boot.Predesk, which even I couldn’t mess up. There is a "trouble-shooting" section in the manual should things go wrong. On running the software, a control icon appears on the icon bar (see below); the status line is optional.

Configuring

This is where things get a little more complicated. The Configuration window, as shown below, contains three main areas. The "Settings" are there for fine tuning and, since the application worked well first time, I elected to leave these on their default settings. There is documentation explaining these parameters. Not all of the Options are explained in the manual, but an email to WSS elicited a prompt and friendly response. In fact, the manual tells you all you need unless you are going to get really techie! The "Immediate" option controls whether printing begins as soon as the rendered image starts to arrive or waits until the whole image is spooled and control returned to the user. "TD copies" is for use with Turbo Driver.

Testing

I ran two sets of documents, each without FastSpool+ running, then with FastSpool+ but with "Immediate" turned off and then with FastSpool+ running and "Immediate" turned on. This gave six test results to compare.

First, I printed two fairly full A5 pages, including a small graphic frame, printed side-by-side across an A4 sheet and second, a full A4 sheet, again containing a small graphic, printed three times.

In each case, I noted how long it took to start printing, how soon control was returned to the user and how long the whole operation took. The results are shown in the table below.

It is immediately clear that, although printing with FastSpool+ may take slightly longer overall because of the spooling, this is more than made up for by the swiftness of return of control to the user.

Control of the spooler queue is given by the Spool Queue Control window (see above), allowing jobs to be paused, requeued, reprinted or the queue to be flushed - the "nuke" option is for when it has all gone wrong!

Conclusion

FastSpool+ (v.1.21) was tested on a RiscPC SA with 96Mb RAM + 2Mb VRAM with a Canon BJC-620. It wasn't possible to test it on a network although past experience with networks leads me to think that it would be as effective there as with a stand-alone machine.

I rated FastSpool+ as a good value, useful utility and I can't think how I have survived for so many years without something of this sort. I recommend it.

FastSpool+ from Warm Silence Software costs 15ukp +VAT (17.63ukp).

Jonathan Conner, jcconner@argonet.co.uk