How do I adjust my printer's DEFAULT printer settings?

The simple answer is this...

It all gets down to whether the Presets are "sticky" or "temporary". And we can control this.

(If you don't have a Preset for what to want as the Default, you can create one. I'll explain that in PART 2 below. I think this is the case for 1-Sided option).

PART 1: Make the selected Presets persist, until you change them.

• On the Print Dialog page, near the top, there is a Presets menu (your's probably says "Default Settings"). Click on this menu.

• Then choose Edit Preset List...

• Another dialog will pop-up.
• Uncheck the box shown below. Unchecking it means that you will NOT go back to Defaults on subsequent print jobs. This Preset will persist (sticky) until you choose something different.
• This behavior applies all Presets (both Standard Presets, as well as Print Job Presets). What is highlighted in the list (e.g.. the 2X) has nothing to do with the check-box at the bottom (just unfortunate confusion).

• Finally, you can now select a Presets, ,and keep them active for the next Print Job.
• When I choose my "Black and White Preset", it goes back to to it every time.
• Even when I click other options for a "one time" color print, it still goes back to my "Black and White Preset".

Note: If you want the old behavior (going back to Defaults on every print job), you can check re-check this box and go back to the original behavior. This may be handy in the case were many people share the same computer.

PART 2: What if the Preset you need does not exist? (optional)

You can create your own presets. There is little or no documentation on this, but I did experiment a bit with it, so take this with a grain of salt.

• On the Print Dialog page, choose the settings that you'd like to save in a Preset, but don't click the blue Print button yet.
• Now, click on the Presets pull-down Menu, and select "Save Current Settings as Preset"

• Type in a name for your new Preset. Note: I prefer the Print Job Presets, over the Custom Presets, but you may want to explore both.

I did play with this, and this is how I was able to make the 1-sided option persist on my printer.

Cheers!

-Craig

adam0072 wrote:

canon mf743cdw. The options are there to turn off 2-sided printing, and I can easily manually select it, but I want to change the DEFAULT so I don't have to keep changing this every time I print a document.

This Apple Support article should help: Save frequently used print settings for routine printing on Mac - Apple Support

You would replace:

*DefaultDuplex: DuplexNoTumble

with:

*DefaultDuplex: None/Off: "<< >>setpagedevice"

Note the main idea here is the word Default in DefaultDuplex. You're changing the default setting from DuplexNoTumble to None/Off.

Without seeing your print dialogue under normal use, I don't know if this may cause its own issue of never being to select duplex when you do want to use it.

These PPD instructions tend to be pretty long. It might be a good idea to post the entire thing so we can see what's all in there. Use the Additional text box for the PPD text.

If you want to give that one change a try, you can't really hurt anything. Move the original .gz file to the desktop so the only one in the Contents folder is your modified file. Otherwise, the OS will have no idea which one to use. You also may need to remove the printer in Settings and add it again. It all depends on whether or not the printer entry pointed directly to a .gz file it can no longer find.

After you make all the settings that you want to save and use by default you need to name that under the presets line item (save current settings as preset). Name it "default #1" as an example. Then from now on that name will have your corresponding settings remembered for the next time. Just keep using "Default #1" here's is the screen shot:

tbirdvet wrote:

You can set and forget. Mine stays the way I have it set from the last use. If you make a default to B&W it will stay that way.

LAST USED option is just that… you get whatever you did last time which can occasionally be an envelope, color, different paper, size, etc.

DEFAULT on the other hand, gives you an expected set of settings every single time no matter what you did last time. In other words, you don’t have to remember to change it back to black-and-white if you happen to use the color mode the previous day.

By "fix", I mean you're trying to use the phrase Default to mean your idea of default. I've never known (or maybe, don't recall) Default for printers to mean anything other than the printer vendor's default. If that's color, then color is what it will print regardless of what you actually want.

If I choose Default for our VersaLink C405, it goes to single sided color printing with "automatic" color. Which I never, ever use. I have profiles for the papers we use, which is why I have separate color options saved. Color management for the print driver is completely disabled, and the profile is chosen under color instead of just ColorSync > Automatic.

You're going to have to rethink "default" as something you have no control over. Those settings are set by the manufacturer in the drivers. Either that, or you can play with the driver itself and change it so the "default" is B&W.

If I double click the installed .gz driver, it extracts the text file with all of the driver information. I then did a search for default, which had 178 entries. I knew which one I wanted so I just skimmed through the text until I got to here:

*CloseGroup: PaperOutput

*OpenGroup: ImageOptions/Image Options

*OpenUI *XRColorCorrection/Color Correction: PickOne

*OrderDependency: 10 AnySetup *XRColorCorrection

*DefaultXRColorCorrection: Auto

*XRColorCorrection Auto/Xerox Automatic Color: ""

*XRColorCorrection Gray/Xerox Black and White: ""

*XRColorCorrection Commercial/Commercial: ""

*XRColorCorrection VividRGB/Vivid RGB: ""

*XRColorCorrection Vivid/Vivid Color: ""

*XRColorCorrection None/None: ""

*CloseUI: *XRColorCorrection

*OpenUI *XRColorAdjustmentSet/CMYK Color: PickOne

*OrderDependency: 10 AnySetup *XRColorAdjustmentSet

*DefaultXRColorAdjustmentSet: None

Now, if I wanted to, I should be able to change just the one line so Auto uses b&w, like this:

*CloseGroup: PaperOutput

*OpenGroup: ImageOptions/Image Options

*OpenUI *XRColorCorrection/Color Correction: PickOne

*OrderDependency: 10 AnySetup *XRColorCorrection

*DefaultXRColorCorrection: Auto

*XRColorCorrection Auto/Xerox Black and White: ""

*XRColorCorrection Gray/Xerox Black and White: ""

*XRColorCorrection Commercial/Commercial: ""

*XRColorCorrection VividRGB/Vivid RGB: ""

*XRColorCorrection Vivid/Vivid Color: ""

*XRColorCorrection None/None: ""

*CloseUI: *XRColorCorrection

*OpenUI *XRColorAdjustmentSet/CMYK Color: PickOne

*OrderDependency: 10 AnySetup *XRColorAdjustmentSet

*DefaultXRColorAdjustmentSet: None

Save the file, and make that the new driver. You don't have to compress it back to a .gz archive, it will work as is.

But if you want to try this type of thing, make sure you back up the installed driver first so you can put it back in case your changes don't work.

tbirdvet wrote:

You can set and forget. Mine stays the way I have it set from the last use. If you make a default to B&W it will stay that way.

You are correct, and I agree. This behavior is possible.

But what I discovered, is that it requires we first [ ] uncheck a somewhat obscure (hard to find, and not well documented) Setting. Hence, this is why different poster here seem to have different results.

To enable and disable the behavior, users have to navigate to, and then UnCheck the box labeled Reset Presets Menu to "Default Setting" After Printing (described in my previous post).

Cheers!

This is the best way I have found to adjust the DEFAULT print settings on MacOS.

https://kb.mit.edu/confluence/display/mitcontrib/Change+the+default+print+settings+on+a+Mac

As Kurt Lang mentioned, different printers display things differently, but here's what my Canon AIO printer dialog box looks like. It's been set this way for a long time now, but I vaguely recall having to make the changes I want it defaulted to (when it's set to Default Settings)...and print something. From then on it comes up with the Default Settings set up the way I want.

tbirdvet wrote:

Then from now ... ... Just keep using "Default #1"

You're missing the whole point of the OP's question.

He doesn't want to click options. He wants to SET AND FORGET.

Take for instance my case. I have a printer that has color available. But I rarely use color (maybe 5% of the time). I want to set the printer DEFAULT to "color=OFF", and then forget it.

On the rare cases (5%) when I actually want color, I don't mind a few clicks to get there.

NOTE:

This is how I print most of the time: CMD-P and then a <RETURN>

But sometimes, it's even quicker... like when you're in Finder with a doc selected, you just hit CMD-P (no dialog box comes up... perfect!!)

When you have a color printer, there's no possible way to fix it on a B&W setting. Not unless you use B&W all the time. In which case, why would you even bother purchasing a color printer?

The OS can't possibly know when you want to use B&W or color. It's not sentient and it can't read your mind. If the last thing you printed was color, then that's what will come up the next time.

I made four saved settings for my printer. The one I last used will show as the current setting:

If that's now what I want right at that moment, then I choose the one I do want from my saved settings:

Kurt Lang wrote:

That exact make and model printer are you using? Some don't even give you an option to turn duplexing off.

The setting (in my case, Color) can clearly be controlled from the MacOS Printer Dialog page. What I (and the OP) are looking for is a way to make a setting part of the DEFAULT, so that we don't have to Mouse & Click to change that setting every time we print.

Kurt Lang wrote:

When you have a color printer, there's no possible way to fix it on a B&W setting.

...

I'm not sure what specifically you mean by "fix it".

What we want is to "default it". In other words, make the print dialog page come up with Color=OFF as the default each time I print (instead of Color=ON, like it does now).

(See picture from my previous post)

The OS can't possibly know when you want to use B&W or color. It's not sentient and it can't read your mind.

What we have is: Default to Color every time, unless I select something different in the Dialog Page.

What we want is: Default to B&W every time unless I select something different in the Dialog Page.

If the last thing you printed was color, then that's what will come up the next time.

No, that's only true if you have the Dialog Page set to "Last Used Setting", instead of "Default". Look for yourself.

A decade or so ago, when these concepts were invented, users could have a "Default" which they could specify, and a "Last Used Settings" which repeats the set print job settings. Simple.

Somehow today, users can no longer specify what settings are in the Default. Or maybe it's just harder to find?

Hello, Kurt Lang. I was having a problem with my older Canon printer Imageclass MF8380cdw defaulting to double-sided printing, and now that I upgraded to Sonoma 14, the ability to change the default from double to single-sided as a preset is now grayed out. I attempted to change the default settings in CUPS, but it that feature is absent in those settings for my printer. I'd like to try to test your method by editing the driver, as you outlined above, but when I go to the Library/Printers, the printer drivers are hidden, the folder appears empty. Advice?