Ricoh InfoPrint Pro C900AFP Planning Guide - Page 23

additional printer. If the addition of a printer degrades performance to an unacceptable level, add an additional server to your network to drive this printer. You might also consider upgrading system and network hardware. Finally, it is important to monitor the performance of your printing environment regularly to see how the system reacts to actual usage and the changing needs of your business. InfoPrint Manager provides useful tools to make such monitoring easy. You can use standard accounting and audit logs to collect statistical data on jobs processed by any printing device in your environment. You can even customize these logging activities to suit the needs of your business. These logs provide invaluable information about workload balancing. You can also use these logs to determine billing procedures or simply to determine how resources are being used at your installation. Note: The InfoPrint Manager server provides standard accounting logs, and you can also get customized accounting and audit logs with printers that use the PSF DSS. Understanding server configuration options Because InfoPrint Manager for Windows Version 2 Release 3 provides print management for many different environments, it provides two different types of installation on the InfoPrint server: standard and basic installations. Once you have decided to use InfoPrint Manager, the next decision you must make is whether to use the standard server environment or the basic server option. These topics describe how each server runs and should give you an idea of which installation you need. Note: If you read over these information and are unsure about which server configuration is best for you, consult with your InfoPrint representative to make sure that you create the environment that meets your needs. Standard server environment When you install the InfoPrint Manager Server, a standard printing environment is created. This environment is generally appropriate for data center printing or distributed printing of many different types of data (including ASCII, line data, GIF, JPEG, PCL, PDF, PostScript, XML, and TIFF data). Print jobs in the standard environment often consist of billing statements, payroll statements, and application forms. Users submit these jobs from a command line, a workstation application (such as a word processor), or an InfoPrint client (such as InfoPrint Select). In a standard printing environment, InfoPrint Manager assigns jobs to printers through late binding. Late binding is much like going to a crowded restaurant and being put on a waiting list for the next available table: you are not "bound" to a particular table until one becomes available. You might have special requirements, such as a non-smoking table with six places (much like a print job that requires document finishing capabilities or a particular paper size), but the hostess (much like the scheduler on the Infoprint® Server) handles these qualifications for you. Basic server option When you install the Print-on-Demand Feature, the standard server environment is replaced or extended with the basic printing environment. The basic printing environment is generally appropriate for commercial print shops printing large Chapter 1. Introducing InfoPrint Manager for Windows 7