How to print a booklet on a simplex printer

I’m posting this since I struggled quite a bit to find it out myself.

Step 1

Download Adobe Acrobat from here Make sure to uncheck McAfee from the download page if you don’t want it.

Step 2

You’ll now need to figure out the side of the paper on which your printer prints. It’ll take a bit of patience but once you get it right you’re good to go.

This pdf file will be useful.

Go to the print page after opening the pdf by going to File–>Print or by hitting Ctrl+P.

Select Booklet under the page sizing & handling tab.

Now, under booklet subset, select front side only.

Now, comes the tricky part, you need to find out on which side of the page you printer will print on. I suggest using rough paper for this bit. Two sheets will be needed in the case of the test pdf.

Mark the top face of the sheet of paper with a pencil.

Hit enter to start printing the front side.

Now, it put the printed paper back in the tray , so that the marked side is face down.

Enter the print dialog again on adobe reader (Ctrl+P) and this time for booket subset select backside only.

Hit enter.

Now, you should obtain a page with pages 1 and 4 adjacent opposite to 2 and 3 adjacent.(You should be able to fold it into a booklet)

If you this is not the case, then at the step of replacing the paper in the tray, rotate it 180 degrees and try again. Once you get it right, remember all the steps you took (it’ll be different for all printers)

Now that you know the steps, you are ready to print any document.

Just make sure the number of pages is a multiple of 4 (in the case of past exam papers, they’ll all be multiples of 4).

Open your file on adobe acrobat and follow the same steps.

You need not mark the paper again as you only need to follow the previous steps, moving the whole printed stack at once.

Note that after printing both sides, the pages may need some rearrangement before folding.

I hope these steps were clear enough, if not you can contact me via the chat box on the about me page.