Please note: the following tutorial will not work with BarTender Ultralite. The minimum edition requirement required is BarTender Basic.

BarTender is well known for working with our LabelStation printers, Zebra, TEC and TSC printers. One question that has come to my attention, is whether or not it would work with lower budget printers such as Brother and Dymo. Obviously this needed to be investigated. I'm using BarTender Enterprise Automation, which is the highest edition available, but this tutorial will work with all editions except for Ultralite.

Does it actually work?

The short answer is yes, it works like a charm. The long answer is yes, but you need to set everything yourself. Don't be put off by the long answer. This would be the same case if you were using the BarTender software with a LabelStation, Zebra or any other printer.

Why use BarTender over the included software?

So you might be asking yourself, "why spend an extra £150+ on software instead of using the included software"? Great question with a simple answer: it's better! Dymo software is good, Brother software is better, BarTender is best. Depending on the edition of BarTender you choose, you will have a huge selection of features at the tips of your fingers including:

• Local and remote database connectivity (Brother P-Touch Editor has this included for some databases types)
• Data entry forms
• Advanced Barcoding
• Industrial symbols
• Huge selection of shapes
• Instant importing from devices such as scanners and webcams
• Advanced text options
• Lock documents with passwords
• Advanced data serialisation
• Remote printing via a web interface
• Remote printing from a phone or tablet
• and many more features

Using it with Dymo

Using it with Dymo was actually very easy. I was a little surprised because I didn't expect it to have all the Dymo label sizes in a drop-down selection, but it did, which is great! The Dymo software is not my favourite choice so BarTender is a vast improvement when it comes to designing a label for use with a Dymo printer. As a comparison, BarTender lets you move things around more freely, have multiple text boxes, database connectivity, loads of barcode types, images, logos and so much more.

Using it with Brother

When I set the software up for printing to a Brother printer, I found the same thing again with pre-sized label templates. Of course with the Brother printers, they have some labels which are continuous, so you can set the label size manually to a custom length that the printer will cut. The Brother P-Touch Editor is a great piece of software that comes free with the Brother printers, and it's actually very close to the BarTender software when it comes to features and how easy it is to use while being very advanced. The Brother P-Touch Editor does have one feature over BarTender which is the clever ability to know what roll of labels you have inserted into the printer. BarTender lacks this snazzy feature.