Laser Printers
Black-and-white laser printers are available in every ECF lab. The printers are named to match their room location. Printers in Linux labs are named sf1012a, sf1012b, sf1013a, sf1013b, sf1013c and sf1106, and the printers in the ECF Windows labs are named GB144_A, GB144_B, GB150_A, GB150_B, WB255, and SF1106.
Students can send jobs to any printer in any of the Linux labs from any ECF Linux machine, not just the printer in their lab. Likewise, they can print to any ECF Windows printer from any ECF Windows workstation. Select "duplex" for printing on both sides of a page. Printer charges for duplex jobs are reduced by 25 percent to recognize the savings in paper.
For example: A 12-page document sent without the duplex option would use 12 sheets of paper and ink/toner for 12 pages, which would count 12 pages against the printer quota. The same document sent as a duplex job would still use 12 pages of ink but only 6 sheets of paper, reducing the paper portion of the printing quota in half. This results in a net charge of (12 + 6)/2 = 9 pages.
Colour Printers
Colour printers are available for student use. The ECF printer quota also applies to these printers. Each page printed counts as four pages towards your quota. Header pages will not be printed.
There are colour printers located in SF1013 and GB144.
Although these printers permit duplex printing, the 25 percent reduction in printer charges is not applied to duplex jobs sent to them, since the ink costs for these printers are far greater than the cost of the paper.
Paper Quotas
Paper quotas are used to restrict the amount of free printing. Students are given a page allowance per term for the printers in the ECF labs based on their course load.
Students exceeding their printer allowance will have to reimburse ECF for their extra usage ($5/100 pages); payment may be made over the internet by logging into the ECF Student Services website, or in person at the ECF office. Please note that credit card payments can only be taken through the ECF Student Services website. Students should check with their department to see if a departmental printer is available to them. Some departmental printers do not charge for their use.
The school year is broken into three terms — Fall, Winter and Summer. Every student is allocated a print quota for each term. If you exceed this quota by 100 pages or more you will have to pay $5.00 for each 100 pages over quota. Users who do not pay for their excess printing will have their accounts locked. To pay with a credit card, visit the online e-payment site.
The size of an individual's print quota is determined by their course load. Courses with high print demands are allocated higher print quotas.
Any course quota can be adjusted to better reflect the print load of a particular course. The course instructor should contact phil@ecf.utoronto.ca to initiate this process. If an ECF printer provides unacceptable print quality you can bring your pages to the ECF Office (EA212) to have your print quota adjusted. We will need to know which printer was used and when the job was printed. This should be done as soon as possible (within a few business days). The print header page should be included whenever possible.
Student Print Quotas Per Term
The current normal/default print quota per course is as follows:
- First-year APSC courses: 150
- Second-year APSC courses: 170
- Third-year APSC courses: 180
- Fourth-year APSC courses: 200
- Graduate courses: 150
- Non-APSC courses: 100
Example: All Term
- MIE496Y1 200 (full-year course, fourth year = 200/term)
- CIV514H1 200 (1/2 course, fourth year = 200)
- MAT188H1 150 (1/2 course, first year = 150)
- MSE250H1 60 (1/4 course, second year = 120/2 = 60)
- MSE290Y1 60 (1/4 course, second year = 120/2 = 60)
- HIS364H1 100 (1/2 course, Arts & Science = 100)
- ECE318H1 180 (1/2 course, third year = 180)
Total: 950 (pay extra fees if 1049 pages are exceeded).
Example: Spring Term
- MIE496Y1 200 (full year course, fourth year = 200/term)
- ANT253H1 100 (1/2 course, Arts & Science = 100)
- STA247H1 100 (1/2 course, Arts & Science = 100)
Total: 400 (pay extra fees if 499 pages are exceeded).
Although we are assigning the same quota to all courses in the same year of study, we can assign a different quota for every course. We hope to gather enough information from the staff and students to make this possible.
The 'pq' command on the ECF LINUX systems will show your current print totals and quota limit as of 3:00 a.m.
The print quota is generated every day using information from the student record system. If you drop/add a course your quota will be adjusted automatically.