Pcounter for Windows

Pcounter for Windows 2.x works with Windows 2000/2003 in mixed or native mode. It works with and can display user lists in NT4-compatible and Active Directory domains and organizational units directly without any need to import or create printing accounts.

Pcounter for Windows consists of a Printer Control service, a Data Server service, and port monitors which control printing to network printers. This provides for a flexible, modular, and expandable system. Pcounter can track printers which are hosted on Windows Servers and/or Workstations, and parallel printers hosted on Windows 9.x workstations.

Printers which are monitored by Pcounter will use Pcounter ports as replacements for the built-in or third-party Windows spooler ports. Pcounter's use of port monitors allow it to precisely monitor the flow of data to printers. Processing only occurs at print time, resulting in significantly lower CPU utilization and overhead. Other products which are only Windows service-based cannot match Pcounter's precision and efficiency.

The Pcounter Printer Control service and Pcounter port monitors work together to manage printers and are used at the same time on Windows print servers.  Port monitors include support for the following protocols:

• AppSocket - raw TCP/IP, supported by HP, Lexmark, Xerox, etc., including support for bidirectional page counting by getting job information from the printer.
• LPR
• Parallel ports
• The OtherPrinter port, which moves jobs to another print queue on the same server. This allows support for printers which use protocols not directly supported by Pcounter port monitors, such as USB, DLC and AppleTalk.
• Parallel port monitor for Windows 9.x

The Pcounter Data Server service manages all Pcounter printer accounting data and can run on any Windows NT4 or later computer, enabling all Pcounter data to be kept centrally in a single location.

These components allow Pcounter the flexibility to easily scale to the size of your network. For instance, if all printers are located on one Windows print server, the data can be kept on the same computer by running both services and installing the port monitors. Likewise, in a distributed printing environment, the Printer Control service can be used with port monitors on many Windows print servers, while running the Data Server service on another Windows computer, or even on one of the Windows print servers. In addition, the parallel port monitor for Windows 95/98 communicates with the Windows Data Server service, and allows you to track locally connected printers to those workstations.

Other Features

• Pcounter has been fully updated and tested with Windows Server 2003.
• Pcounter works on networks where Samba is authenticating logons.
• Pcounter can automatically assign print job ownership from other platforms (such as Mac and Unix) or delete the job if an owner cannot be found, or they can use the Web Client to authenticate their jobs.
• Pcounter works with multiple and/or trusted domains.
• Printing accounts for network users do not need to be created or imported. Pcounter creates them automatically if necessary.
• Pcounter works in Citrix and Terminal Services environments.
• Built in LPD server with more features and better Macintosh support than the Microsoft LPD service.
• Intelligent job load balancing across multiple printers.
• Integration with external LDAP servers via an additional DLL.