My HP PSC 750 printer will always print from the last page to the first page, even when I select the box to print ‘Front to Back’. How do I make the printer start with the first page? Also, how can I download the ZoneAlarm firewall you have recommended in previous columns? The computer is running Windows XP.

Well, as luck would have it I also have a HP PSC 750 printer and have experienced the same problem. This problem frequently arises because the printer settings are a bit confusing. When you select ‘Front to Back’ this means the printout will be presented in the final order of front-to-back (i.e. the back page will be printed first, so it’s the last page in the printout stack; and the front page will be printed last, so it’s the first page on the printout stack). Selecting ‘Back to Front’ will yield the opposite results: the front page is printed first and the back page is printed last, so the printout stack is presented in the back-to-front order). This can be quite confusing, and has caught me out on many occasions! If you find that the printer will still not print in the correct order, the problem may be application specific. For example, Microsoft Word has the option ‘Reverse print order’ which will start printing documents with the last page. In Word, go to the ‘Tools’ menu > ‘Options’ and click the ‘Print’ tab. Ensure that ‘Reverse print order’ is not enabled. You can also find this option by going to ‘File’ > ‘Print’ and click the ‘Options’¦’ button at the bottom of the window. If ‘Reverse print order’ is not enabled, you may like to try enabling the option to see the effects and whether it actually fixes the problem.

Regarding ZoneAlarm, the free version is a bit tricky to find on their website but it is available. Go to www.zonealarm.com and click the ‘Download & Buy’ link. At the top of the page, click the ‘ZoneAlarm’ tab. On the next page that loads, click the ‘Free download’ button. Finally, on the next page click the ‘Download FREE ZoneAlarm’ link. Alternatively, the direct page to download ZoneAlarm Free is www.zonelabs.com/store/content/company/products/znalm/freeDownload.jsp.