Me vs Win XP

For reasons unbeknown to me, the Dell Optiplex I have at work has now decided to print a page with with name, etc. before everything I print. After much online searching and struggling to find the proper terms to search with (thanks for nothing, Microsoft!) I think I have stumbled onto the term used which is 'Separator Page'.

Thinking that must be the problem, I boldly go into the Printers and Faxes sub-menu. Now I choose between Properties instead of Preferences (although I can get to Preferences via Properties as well - go figure). Dig, dig, dig and finally find a button labeled 'Separator Page,' and smugly click it. Oh. there is no separator page selected. Hmm, let's see what the Redmond crowd says about that. I find:

To set a separator page for a print device, follow these steps:

1.	Access the General tab of the printer's Properties dialog box and then click on the Separator Page button.
2.	In the Separator Page dialog box, click Browse and then select one of the three available separator pages: • PCL.SEP Switches the print device to PCL mode and prints a separator page before each document. • PSCRIPT.SEP Sets the print device to PostScript mode but doesn't print a separator page.

So... I can set a separator page that will not print a separator page? Sounds odd but I recall when you wanted MS Word to use the UK dictionary the official solution was 'hide existing US dictionary and rename "UK dictionary" to "US dictionary".'

Did this solve the problem? No. I am still getting a page before EVERY document regardless of application that lists User/Host/Class & Job.

So, today in the battle between me and Windows XP the biggest loser would be the trees closely followed by my productivity.