Zebra Printer Problems

I arrived at this script.  It works on a Gx420t with Factory defaults.  It’s not exactly what I was aiming for, but it’s pretty close. 

^XA

^LT10    //Label Top.  Sets the top edge of the label (determined experimentally)

^PW200   //Print Width.  Sets the left edge of the label (determined experimentally)

^LH10,15 //Label Home.  Offsets from left and top edges from which fields positions are relative to.

^PR2     //Print Rate.  2 is the slowest setting

^MD30    //Media Darkness.  Set to maximum darkness

^BY1     //Set the barcode bar-width to 1 dot … If not set, the previous setting will be used.  The factory default is too big for this label.

^FO0,0^BCN,26,N,N,N,N^FD%s^FS

^FO0,30^A0,20,17^FD%s^FS

^FO0,50^A0,20,17^FD%s^FS

^XZ

Some key insights:

a)      the gx420t has lower resolution(203dpi) than the gx430t (300dpi), so all positions and sizes needed to be determined again.  Multiplying everything by 2/3 was insufficient…I had to do it experimentally.  

b)      Some settings persist between print jobs (examples: ^PW, ^BY).  The printer maintains state between jobs.  Not all of the printers state is visible through the web interface.  It’s important to develop and test your scripts against a printer with factory default settings.  To restore factory defaults you must apply ‘restore default settings’ AND then power-cycle the printer.