Solved Firefox: How to always use the system print dialog?

Edwin said:

Click to expand...

This is what I get:

Do you get this at any site? What happens if you proceed to print?

spapakons said:

Do you get this at any site? What happens if you proceed to print?

Click to expand...

Yes, I get this consistently. I can print from it, but would prefer to do so from the system print dialogue, which for example is more convenient as I can there turn off duplex printing if I dont want it.

In case it helps, you may be able to get the legacy Print dialog everywhere, using the Registry method shown below:

(eg: setting the PreferLegacyPrintDialog to 0 shows the modern print dialog in all applications (including Firefox), and setting it to 1 shows the legacy dialog).

Editing the registry would put me out of my comfort zone. I simply want to get the same print dialogue when printing from Firefox and Notepad, as I do with (I think every other app I use - eg Libre Office & PDF Xchange editor) which both give me what I take to be the more desired "System print dialogue", which is the subject of this thread.

I was hoping for a straightforward answer to the further queries I raised in relation to posts 47 & 48. From my perspective, that doesn't work.

If you switch the setting from false to true (see older posts) in Firefox you get the system print dialogue. I have no printer, so I have not used the new Windows 11 print dialogue and I cannot guide you. If you look carefully there should be a way to access the printer settings and change the dual side printing. Probably the Registry hack suggested restores the familiar old print dialogue from Windows 7. I will try it and report.

spapakons said:

If you switch the setting from false to true (see older posts) in Firefox you get the system print dialogue.

Click to expand...

Post 61 shows what I get. AFAIK this is not the system print dialogue - or is it?

Keithjr said:

... this is not the system print dialogue - or is it?

Click to expand...

It's trying to be, but, it's buggy as heck..., actually, it's garbage!
You gotta go with the reg hack to get the Legacy Dialog.

Just to report that I added the "PreferLegacyPrintDialog" in Registry and it worked right away. I now have the legacy print dialogue we all know and trust since Windows 7.

I am not so bothered whether I have the current system print dialogue or the legacy system print dialogue. This change seems to happened without my notice. I think I would be quite happy with either dialogue as long as I get a consistent response to a print command. Is it necessary to hack the registry in order to achieve this?

Print is messed up in Firefox, pages missing, or blank..., not so in Chrome...

Keithjr said:

I am not so bothered whether I have the current system print dialogue or the legacy system print dialogue. This change seems to happened without my notice. I think I would be quite happy with either dialogue as long as I get a consistent response to a print command. Is it necessary to hack the registry in order to achieve this?

Click to expand...

I'm afraid yes. I manually added the key in Registry since I know what I am doing, but you can just open a Command Prompt as Administrator (right-click on start key and select it from the list) and copy-paste this code:

reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Print\UnifiedPrintDialog" /v "PreferLegacyPrintDialog" /d 1 /t REG_DWORD /f

then press ENTER to execute. This will automatically add they key and enable the legacy print dialogue.

I get the same as @Keithjr (post #61) including the "No preview available" message. I find the lack of the print preview as a big 'No No' but nobody has commented on this omission? I have reverted back to the default 'false' for the print.prefer_system_dialog setting so I can see a print preview.

Is it just me that really wants to see a print preview? I would have thought it important to be able to select pages for printing so as not to waste paper and ink.

It is important to preview in webpages because most times it is not WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get), you see only the header of the page and the rest is blank due to some weird layout programming. This is VERY annoying when trying to print websites with products, for example, so you can show your wife/friend or for your comparison at later time.

spapakons said:

I'm afraid yes. I manually added the key in Registry since I know what I am doing, but you can just open a Command Prompt as Administrator (right-click on start key and select it from the list) and copy-paste this code:

reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Print\UnifiedPrintDialog" /v "PreferLegacyPrintDialog" /d 1 /t REG_DWORD /f

then press ENTER to execute. This will automatically add they key and enable the legacy print dialogue.

Click to expand...

Hi spapakons,

I ran your registry tweak, and restarted. On printing from Firefox, I still get the same print dialogue as per my post #61.
Then I jumped in to reg edit and had a look (as far as I could) at this entry. Looking under HKEY_CURRENT_USER, I attach the result when I got to the UnifiedPrintDialog bit.



Does this look right to you?

Keithjr said:

Does this look right to you?

Click to expand...

No..., this is what you should have:

Well, I ran it carefully twice, following the instructions, but I dont get that.

Ahhhh...

Logged out of my user account, then went in to Admin login. I get the result there ok.

And my print dialogue looks like this

Keithjr said:

And my print dialogue looks like this

Click to expand...

And...,
if you want the Windows System Dialog (Legacy) in Firefox...



... you must also toggle this about:config preference to true:



In Chrome, simply use Ctrl+Shift+P.

Thanks, Edwin, I can now get what I want under my Admin login.

But what I would prefer, is for the tweak shown in post #75 to work on my User login. Is that possible? Or can I add the missing bits manually - I would be nervous doing this