A print engine controller for a pagewidth inkjet printer includes an interface for connection to an input data bus to receive page data to be processed prior to printing. A data bus is connected to the interface to communicate data to various circuitry components of the controller. A memory is connected to the data bus and is configured so that as one page is loaded another previously loaded page is read from the memory to permit the controller to act in a double-buffered manner. A print engine pipeline is connected to the data bus and is configured to read the page data from the memory and process the page data into a form suitable for printing by the pagewidth inkjet printer.