Bottom margin changes to 3.5cm when printing in Word 2008

[zigzi]

I've tried publishing layout, creating sections and changing every margin/footer setting I can think of to no avail. My printer is capable of borderless printing but Word 2008 insists on leaving an ugly 3.5cm of white space at the bottom of the printed page even though my bottom margin is set to 0. Pages look fine in print layout view, but the margin increases in print preview - why?

 

[CyberTaz]

Hi zigzi -

The typical explanation is that the printer is capable of printing
borderless *photographs*, most commonly 8x10 or smaller & requires that you
specify some type of photo paper is being used for the job. IOW,
"borderless" doesn't universally mean edge-to-edge. Printers most often have
minimum margin settings required on one or more sides in order to draw the
paper through for anything other than photo-quality paper. I believe that's
what you're up against.

Word is only guilty of allowing you to believe your printer is capable of
something it is refusing to do. Word will allow you to make the
specification because it assumes you will - eventually - print to a device
capable of doing the job, even though the currently selected printer may not
be able to. That's why the margin is noticeable in Print Preview, which is
generated by the currently selected printer.

 

[John McGhie]

Just make sure there IS nothing in the footer

Word will automatically increase the footer to accommodate its content. If
that means moving the document impression margins in, it will do that.

So check that your Footer style does not have a crazy font size or leading
(space before, after, or line height) set. If it does, Word will make room
for it, whether there are any characters in the line or not.

If you turn off the headers and footers, it won't do that.

The fault you are describing is rather indicative of having a USA Letter
page size set for a document headed for a printer containing A4 paper.
Check that your page size in Word is in fact set for A4

Hope this helps

I've tried publishing layout, creating sections and changing every
margin/footer setting I can think of to no avail. My printer is capable of
borderless printing but Word 2008 insists on leaving an ugly 3.5cm of white
space at the bottom of the printed page even though my bottom margin is set to
0. Pages look fine in print layout view, but the margin increases in print
preview - why?

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[zigzi]

Many thanks Bob and John for your responses.

Paper size is definitely set to A4 (both under page setup and document setup)and Header & footer set to zero. The document looks absolutely fine in Word print preview, however when I click on "Print..." the print preview built into Mac 10.5 (Leopard) shows the increased bottom margin. If I print to any of my 3 installed printers, same thing happens, including printing to Adobe PDF. Very strange.

For what its worth, I have no problems printing from Adobe CS3 suite.

 

[CyberTaz]

The information in your last post suggest that the problem is *not* with
Word... If it were Print Preview would display the same as what you're
seeing in Apple's Preview app. Everything there is generated by OS X print
services & your printer's driver software. Being able to print from another
program really isn't relevant unless you're dealing with exactly the same
document, I'm afraid.

Have you recently checked to see if there is an update available for the
printer driver?

HTH |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

 

[John McGhie]

I suggest that you check the properties of two specific styles: "Footer"
and "Page Number".

Setting the Header and Footer location to "0" has no effect if the header or
footer in the document is requesting space, whether it contains any visible
characters or not. If Word thinks the header or footer is going to require
space, it will move the margin in, regardless of whether there is anything
in the header or footer.

Other than that, I am out of ideas

Many thanks Bob and John for your responses.

Paper size is definitely set to A4 (both under page setup and document
setup)and Header & footer set to zero. The document looks absolutely fine in
Word print preview, however when I click on "Print..." the print preview built
into Mac 10.5 (Leopard) shows the increased bottom margin. If I print to any
of my 3 installed printers, same thing happens, including printing to Adobe
PDF. Very strange.

For what its worth, I have no problems printing from Adobe CS3 suite.

--
Don't wait for your answer, click here: http://www.word.mvps.org/

Please reply in the group. Please do NOT email me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
http://jgmcghie.fastmail.com.au/
Nhulunbuy, Northern Territory, Australia
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]