Enabling Double-Sided Printing By Default

> For Macintosh

If there's a double-sided–capable printer in your office you can set it to print double-sided by default rather than having to change the setting each time you print. The instructions below are written for a Windows-based computer. They are also available as a printable pdf document suitable for hardcopy circulation.

Step 1: Click on the "Start" button, click on "Settings" then click on "Printers".

Figure 1: opening the "printers" window

This should open a new window with all the printers you use listed in it.

Step 2: Right-click on the icon for the printer that has double-sided capabilities. This will open up a menu, as shown in Figure 2 below. Click on "Printing Preferences…". The menu may have different options listed (this depends on the version of Windows you have); in earlier versions of Windows click on "Document Defaults…" or "Default Settings".

Figure 2: opening the default print settings dialogue box

This should open up a new window with various printing options. Any changes you make in here set the default print settings for this printer.

Step 3: The window will probably look different for different printers. You need to find the option for double-sided printing. This might be called "Duplex Printing", "2-sided Printing" or "Double-Sided Printing". If you are lucky the setting will be visible now; if so skip to step 4.

If you can't see the setting for double-sided printing, open up the advanced settings section by clicking on the "Advanced…" button:

Figure 3: Select advanced settings

Step 4: There are two possible variations for double-sided printing options, depending on the printer you are setting up: either a choice between "Long edge binding" and "Short edge binding" (sometimes called "Flip on long edge" / "Flip on short edge"), or a choice of "Top-Top" and "Top-Bottom".

Choice of "Long edge" or "Short edge" binding

If you usually print things in Portrait (vertical) format select the option for "Long Edge Binding":

Figure 4: select duplex mode

The table below illustrates how the two settings "long-edge binding" and "short-edge binding" work in conjunction with Portrait and Landscape mode printing.

Choice of "Top-Top" or "Top-Bottom"

For most general printing the best setting is "Top-Top". This means your pages will flip from left to right, like a book:

Figure 5: select duplex mode (Top-Top)

The table below illustrates how the two settings "Top-Top" and "Top-Bottom" work in conjunction with Portrait and Landscape mode printing.

Step 6: Once you've set the double-siding option, click "OK" on any open dialogue boxes:

Figure 6: click "OK" on open dialogue boxes

That's it! From now on documents you print to this printer will print double-sided by default. If for some reason you don't want to print a document double-sided, you can turn the feature off on a document-by-document basis by selecting "Printing Preferences" in the print dialogue box.