Converting Windows .PRN file (PCL) to PDF

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I have been succesfully capturing PCL content sent by old machinery to a parallel port and converting it to PDF using GhostPCL for a while.

However, we have some older industrial machinery which is based on Windows 2000 and outputs to a HP Laserjet printer via the parallel port. Unfortunately, the software on the machine does not allow additional software or printers to be installed.

The problem is that whilst the captured output appears to be PCL graphic data, I have not found any tools which can convert it - GhostPCL attempts, and you can make out the text a little, but it is completely corrupted.

The captured output results in the output from GhostPCL

I can see that the captured output starts with:

ESC E (PCL command for Reset)
ESC &l0L (PCL command to disable skip perforation)
ESC &r1U (*** UNKNOWN ***)
ESC &l1H (PCL command to Feed from tray 2)
ESC *o0M (*** UNKNOWN ***)
ESC &126A (PCL command for A4 portrait paper)
ESC *g8W (PCL command to configure raster data - 8 bytes)

I can see that the captured output has some PCL codes which do not appear in the official documentation, which results in the weird characters at the start of the PDF.

Does anyone know how to convert this file to PDF ?

ghostscript pdf
1 Answers

Your description shows an attempt to read a language different to pcl, so was the older system designed to talk to a default printer using Epson ESCAPE encoding. so its a dot printing file that the hardware will position those dots in the correct place and pressure, you could try converting to a bmp then massage the image into a pdf page. enter image description here

You say an HP is connected but is that the true capture of what it is agreeing to use at runtime?

For example If I attempt to save my HP inkjet print file at time of printing I will get a PDF ! but why since the printer normally cant handle those direct? enter image description here

What may I find If I look and see the default printing language is not set to a PCL or a PJL one.

There are many pcl language variations so a PRN file ideally should have some compatibility declaration such as @PJL ENTER LANGUAGE = PCLXL ) HP-PCL XL;2; Note this is NOT an HP printer just one that declares the following code will be HP style.

The printer can accept many formats and the system can produce many different formats for one printer. Thus you need to check all the system settings to understand what language is actually in run time use. Are you sure that .PRN is a full load of the conversation between the system & printer as print to file is not always the expected 2 way code.

The best way to ensure you capture true printer driver output is to change the drivers output PORT to a fixed filename and ideally use the correct format extension NOT unspecified .prn or .pcl if it is not such.

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