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I got an HP LaserJet 1100 for college at it's lasted 4 years *without* needing a replacement toner cartrigde.

I did start having a problem of multiple sheets feeding, but HP provided a FREE repair kit (which I ordered via their website). Now the printer works like new again!

As far as Linux compatibility, visit here for ratings of the vendors and Linux printing troubleshooting.

I currently own an old Canon printer and have been very happy with it, but am looking for a new printer to replace it (It busted just a couple days ago). I've ruled out another Canon as a possibility because the LinuxPrinting.org vendor report card gives Canon a C-. What printer do you have, which driver does it use, and does it work well under Linux?

Arriving in the email!!! Wow what will they think of next? No wonder you have problems with it. Your ink jet probably is set to too low of a resolution to print the circuit, for more help on setting up your printer check out linuxprinting.org

For example: no Linux support for my printer. I don't have my scanner working yet.

Printers
Scanners

CD burning: well, OK, when I've worked out how to do it in 2.2.18.

Kernel 2.2.18 is positively ancient and you need to upgrade it if you want any "new" devices to work. USB support in particular is much better in kernel 2.4 than it was in 2.2. If you want to get your CD-RW working, Search comp.os.linux.hardware for keywords "CD-RW howto" since questions involving CD-RWs get asked and answered there all the time.

Wireless hub setup via USB? Nope. USB ADSL modem? Nope.

See above comment about better USB support with new kernels. USB networking is a Goddess-awful kludge, but some devices do work... you know how to use Google, right?

Winmodems? Nope.

The linmodems page has a lot of information on which ones work (many Lucent models, some Conexant, some others) and links/HOWTOs for getting them working.

Digital camera? Who knows...

The people on comp.os.linux.hardware? Most USB digital cameras appear as USB Mass Storage devices, plug in, "mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/camera", copy all the pictures to your hard disk. USB Mass Storage support is much better in kernel 2.4 than is was in 2.2, so upgrade!

The newer Canons, the S series, are worse than the older models. Many of the better models (S520 is a good example) aren't even mentioned on the Gimp-Print pages or at linuxprinting.org

This is a shame, Canon! Cause the S-series for sure are the best printers around.

Bye egghat.

There are two brands worth considering for use with free software ... Epson [and] Hewlett-Packard...

I haven't had any trouble with the Epson Style Color 777 that I bought a year and a half ago. It works great with Linux. I remember when I got the printer, I checked linuxprinting.org and found that Lexmarks weren't very well supported at that time.

I'd second this as well, Win 3.1 will work fine. You probably can find a copy of it in your local second-hand computer shop for cheap as well (I know the one around here has plenty of them)

This is especially useful, seeing as the Un*x printer compatibility database lists the Lexmark Z11 as being only paritally supported. Or to be more specific, the Linux driver does 600dpi colour only. Besides, I highly doubt you'd even want to think about getting X running on that old of a machine.

First check Linux printing if your plotter is listed. If it is, use Cups...

Why are you using woody for newbies? Well, if you're administering it than it's not a big deal, but still. Debian is just about the least user-friendly of the distros (my favorite, but still not user-friendly).

How are you trying to configure your printer? Did you use printtool? Or what about foomatic? The linuxprinting.org page lists it as mostly working. I strongly suggest going a foomatic route if you can, it makes installing printers very easy.

>but you can usually get it to run somehow

Once, I could. But now with everyone going Win2k/WinXP, if there's no NT drivers, your hardware is dead in the water.

At least with Win 9x I could try Win 3.1/DOS drivers and _maybe_ get somewhere.

>SANE does NOT support all known scanners

I have a logitech hand scanner that says windows 2k doesn't either... :-)

>When I put my Radeon into Win2K I definitely had 2D and 3D running straight away.

Maybe if you had the version of Win2K with integrated service packs, but from what I recall, the original build of Win2K came out before the Radeon was released (but perhaps I'm wrong).

Either way, I do know (from experience with an Original Radeon VIVO) that the old Windows drivers for the Radeon crashed most all machines every couple of hours. Ugggh...

>I may have to lose some functionality if I choose not to download the latest drivers

By WinPrinter I'm talking about those printers designed for windows only that have about as much sense as my Timex watch built into them.

I've never seen one of these come with drivers built into windows, but I suppose its possible.

As far as HP printers go, the entire line of DeskJets (AFAIK) are fully supported (for colour) in Linux. I suppose a couple of years ago, before HP jumped on the Linux software bandwagon, you'd have some trouble.

All I know is my decade old 720 dpi Epson Stylus Colour prints like a charm with Ghostscript, but looks *horrible* with the default "ESC/P2" windows drivers. The drivers that came with it (for Win 3.1) did a nice job too, but as is usual with windows, your old hardware is obsoleted before its useless (720 dpi is still a decent resolution).

? Printers don't have to speak PostScript. It makes things easier when they do, since everything speaks PostScript under Unix, but there are PostScript->(printer native data format) converters out there. They typically go by the name "print filters", and every distro includes a metric arseload of them.

PCL is pretty standard, so PostScript->PCL print filters are mature and stable. Your distro's setup tool (YaST, "setup", DrakConf, linuxconf, whatever) almost certainly has a "setup printer" option in it. Use this if you can--it's generally pretty easy, and involves letting the parport auto-detection work, or picking your printer from a list of models. If that doesn't work, try going to linuxprinting.org , entering your printer's model# into the search box, and following the directions.

Over the years, three of my original five referral destinations have dropped their affiliate programs. I'd hate to see any more go away; the whole thing is a fairly marginal enterprise as is.

If this is what some of these programs are really doing, then is strikes me as possibly fraud or certainly a breach of affiliate contract. Either way it will be key for the referral tracking operators to figure out how to detect this; tracking them down by rumour or complaint will be impractical.

Even if your printer isn't supported by default, installing it is usually just a matter of locating and installing the correct software at LinuxPrinting.org. Personally, I ran into a few complications with my supposedly unsupported Lexmark Z43, but the fact that I was eventually able to get it working shows that the Cups system is flexible enough to handle a far greater number of printers than TurboPrint supports.

All thats lacking for linux printing is the knowledge of whats avaliable, check out linuxprinting.org As a summary if you use Redhat use printtool, suse have there own setup in yast, Mandrake probably have something too, for debian or most other distributions use aps though as with most setups you need ghostscript(for postscript conversion) and a printer spooler such as lpd or lprng. Never used it but CUPS is supposed to be easy to use and of course you could just buy a postscript printer. I don't see why this commercial program is needed, use whats out there and free as in beer and speech!

recently in th market to buy a new printer to run under linux i found linuxprinting.org very useful

site features :

a quite considerable database of printers and their suitability to printing under linux,

general discussion of each vendor's track record and present level of support of free software compatability,

good information on th various ways to get printing happening under linux,

and more...

It might work, except there isn't one.

Linuxprinting lists it as a paperweight. This is the danger of buying hardware from vendors who do not have a policy of open driver development. In this case, printers, stay away from anything which isn't an Epson, or perhaps HP. And good luck getting your Nvidia card working with Windows XS in a few years time.

You don't usually have to buy printer drivers either.

As an example with our HP LJ4050N, I got the PPD file from the W2K Postscript driver bundle, and installed it under CUPS. Works great: duplex, alternate paper trays, etc.

Check out CUPS and the LinuxPrinting.org Database

Big

Most of the medium format Styli, including the Photo 1270, (a 13x19 format CMYKcm printer), and the Stylus Colors 1520 and 3000 (both 17x22 CMYK printers) are supported well. The Epson 2000P has preliminary support only; it doesn't work well yet. The large format printers (the 5000, 7000, 7500, 9000, 9500, etc) are not supported, although the 7500 may work soon. Good luck!

In any case, until said progress arrives, people ought to take stock of those companies that offer better support for free software users, and buy products from them. HP makes all sorts of things (reasonable mid-range LAN euipment, workstations, etc) but as I mainly know printers, here's what I know about the industry as things stand right now:

• Epson provides publically available developer information for their printers, scanners, etc. Epson inkjets, therefore, work extraordinarily well using free software drivers.
• Lexmark provides binary RH Linux-x86-only drivers for two representative inkjets. They're klunky, and they're nonfree, but they do work, and they do represent a gimmer of actual Linux support.
• Of the reverse-engineering-reuired inkjets, HP is the best understood, followed by Canon, followed by Lexmark. None, of course, is at all well understood in absolute terms, although the gimp-print folks are rapidly absorbing support and developers from other projects.

As always, if you want to know anything about the state of free software printer support, consult www.linuxprinting.org. Particularly apropos are my vendor scorecards and suggested printers pages.

In any case, until said progress arrives, people ought to take stock of those companies that offer better support for free software users, and buy products from them. HP makes all sorts of things (reasonable mid-range LAN euipment, workstations, etc) but as I mainly know printers, here's what I know about the industry as things stand right now:

• Epson provides publically available developer information for their printers, scanners, etc. Epson inkjets, therefore, work extraordinarily well using free software drivers.
• Lexmark provides binary RH Linux-x86-only drivers for two representative inkjets. They're klunky, and they're nonfree, but they do work, and they do represent a gimmer of actual Linux support.
• Of the reverse-engineering-reuired inkjets, HP is the best understood, followed by Canon, followed by Lexmark. None, of course, is at all well understood in absolute terms, although the gimp-print folks are rapidly absorbing support and developers from other projects.

As always, if you want to know anything about the state of free software printer support, consult www.linuxprinting.org. Particularly apropos are my vendor scorecards and suggested printers pages.

In any case, until said progress arrives, people ought to take stock of those companies that offer better support for free software users, and buy products from them. HP makes all sorts of things (reasonable mid-range LAN euipment, workstations, etc) but as I mainly know printers, here's what I know about the industry as things stand right now:

• Epson provides publically available developer information for their printers, scanners, etc. Epson inkjets, therefore, work extraordinarily well using free software drivers.
• Lexmark provides binary RH Linux-x86-only drivers for two representative inkjets. They're klunky, and they're nonfree, but they do work, and they do represent a gimmer of actual Linux support.
• Of the reverse-engineering-reuired inkjets, HP is the best understood, followed by Canon, followed by Lexmark. None, of course, is at all well understood in absolute terms, although the gimp-print folks are rapidly absorbing support and developers from other projects.

As always, if you want to know anything about the state of free software printer support, consult www.linuxprinting.org. Particularly apropos are my vendor scorecards and suggested printers pages.

The database has links to the drivers needed for each printer, or the filters (LPD, CUPS) that are needed.

Here are the color inkjets that are listed to work "perfectly";

1. Canon - BJC-70, BJC-210, BJC-250, BJC-600, BJC-610, BJC-620, BJC-800, BJC-4000, BJC-4100, BJC-4200, BJC-4300, BJC-4400

   Citizen - ProJet IIc

   Digital - DECwriter 520ic*

   Hewlett Packard - 2000C, 2500C, DesignJet 3500CP, DeskJet 400, DeskJet 420C, DeskJet 500C, DeskJet 540, DeskJet 550C, DeskJet 560C, DeskJet 600, DeskJet 1200C, DeskJet 1600C, DeskJet 1600CM, PaintJet*, PaintJet XL*, PaintJet XL300*

   Lexmark - Optra Color 40, Optra Color 45

   Olivetti - JP350S*, JP450*, JP470*

   Samsung - SI-630A*

   Tektronix - 4696*, 4697*

   Xerox - DocuPrint C20

Here's another example; a list of Lexmark printers (inkjet or not, perfect or not);

1. Lexmark / IBM

2. 1. Perfectly - 4039 10plus, Optra Color 40, Optra Color 45, Optra Color 1200, Optra Color 1275, Optra E*, Optra E+*, Optra E310*, Optra Ep*, Optra K 1220*, Optra R+*, Optra S 1250*, Optra S 1855*, Optra Se 3455*, Optra W810*, Valuewriter 300*

   2. Mostly - 1020 Business, 3000

      Partially - 1000, 1100, 2030, 2070, 3200, 5000, 5700, 7000, 7200, Winwriter 400*, Z11, Z51

      Paperweight - 1020, 2050, Winwriter 100*, Winwriter 150c*, Winwriter 200*

The database has links to the drivers needed for each printer, or the filters (LPD, CUPS) that are needed.

Here are the color inkjets that are listed to work "perfectly";

1. Canon - BJC-70, BJC-210, BJC-250, BJC-600, BJC-610, BJC-620, BJC-800, BJC-4000, BJC-4100, BJC-4200, BJC-4300, BJC-4400

   Citizen - ProJet IIc

   Digital - DECwriter 520ic*

   Hewlett Packard - 2000C, 2500C, DesignJet 3500CP, DeskJet 400, DeskJet 420C, DeskJet 500C, DeskJet 540, DeskJet 550C, DeskJet 560C, DeskJet 600, DeskJet 1200C, DeskJet 1600C, DeskJet 1600CM, PaintJet*, PaintJet XL*, PaintJet XL300*

   Lexmark - Optra Color 40, Optra Color 45

   Olivetti - JP350S*, JP450*, JP470*

   Samsung - SI-630A*

   Tektronix - 4696*, 4697*

   Xerox - DocuPrint C20

Here's another example; a list of Lexmark printers (inkjet or not, perfect or not);

1. Lexmark / IBM

2. 1. Perfectly - 4039 10plus, Optra Color 40, Optra Color 45, Optra Color 1200, Optra Color 1275, Optra E*, Optra E+*, Optra E310*, Optra Ep*, Optra K 1220*, Optra R+*, Optra S 1250*, Optra S 1855*, Optra Se 3455*, Optra W810*, Valuewriter 300*

   2. Mostly - 1020 Business, 3000

      Partially - 1000, 1100, 2030, 2070, 3200, 5000, 5700, 7000, 7200, Winwriter 400*, Z11, Z51

      Paperweight - 1020, 2050, Winwriter 100*, Winwriter 150c*, Winwriter 200*