I have an epson 1650photo
every times I try to access the it from gimp or xsane, I get this error message saying " no devices available".
when I try " cat /proc/bus/usb/devices" I see the scanner vendor and product id.
it seems like the scanner it recognize by the kernel, but it is unable to communicate with the xsane software.
can anyone please tell me how can I make them communicate?
sincerely, clint

You need to edit /etc/sane.d/epson.conf and uncomment the line

usb /dev/usb/scanner0

then everything should work. Epson usb scanners are not recognized by default. I'm curious to hear how your scanner works, since mine seems to work intermittently. I have contacted the maintainer, who is working on the problem, but he doesn't have a lot of time to devote to this right now. If more people experience it, it may become a more worked on problem...

I am trying to get my perfection 1260 photo working so to start with, how should I "uncomment" usb /dev/usb/scanner0 or how to find out whether I need usb /dev/usb/scanner0 or /dev/usbscanner0?

regards

John

With your scanner connected and turned on, run

sane-find-scanner

which will print out a bunch of stuff with a line at the end something like

sane-find-scanner: found USB scanner (vendor = 0x04b8, product = 0x0110) at device /dev/usb/scanner0

which will tell you the device you need. Then, as root, add a line to the file /etc/sane.d/epson.conf the=at looks like

usb /dev/usb/scanner0

(of course, replace "/dev/usb/scanner0" with the appropriate device name) then try using your scanner (from gimp or xsane, or whatever program you would normally use).

I don't see any USB config files for HP. Does that mean they are not supported yet? HP4200C

well mikel,

I can sort of see the scanner from this

# No SCSI scanners found. If you expected something different, make sure that
# you have loaded a SCSI driver for your SCSI adapter.

found USB scanner (vendor=0x04b8 [EPSON], product=0x011d [EPSON Scanner]) at libusb:001:002
# A USB device was detected. This program can't be sure if it's really
# a scanner. If it is your scanner, it may or may not be supported by
# SANE. Try scanimage -L and read the backend's manpage.

# Scanners connected to the parallel port or other proprietary ports can't be
# detected by this program.

But I'm now v confused, as I can't locate the libusb:001:002 and although I have the line that you mention
in the "epson.conf" (as below)

# epson.conf
#
# here are some examples for how to configure the EPSON backend
#
# SCSI scanner:
scsi EPSON
#
# Parallel port scanner:
#pio 0x278
#pio 0x378
#pio 0x3BC
#
# USB scanner - only enable this if you have an EPSON scanner. It could
# otherwise block your non-EPSON scanner from being
# recognized.
# Depending on your distribution, you may need either the
# first or the second entry.
#usb /dev/usbscanner0
#usb /dev/usb/scanner0


I haven't the faintest idea what next - and I can't locate the libusb:001:002 file

so any ideas please?

regards

John

Since my last post, I have followed the instructions at the epson site http://www.epkowa.co.jp/english/linux_e/linux.html and followed the instructions at the "iscan" link.

If i try and start the "iscan" facility in a terminal, I get the terms and conditions, and then it just says "could not send command to scanner"

so I have then followed the instructions at http://www.epkowa.co.jp/english/linu....html#Mandrake and added the scanner manually with # mknod /dev/usb/scanner0 c 180 48 and # chmod 0666 /dev/usb/scanner0 though what this actually does, I haven't a clue, but I can now see the scanner at /dev/usb

I have also found about the "uncomment" thing mentioned earlier and now my /etc/sane.d/epson.conf looks like this

# epson.conf
#
# here are some examples for how to configure the EPSON backend
#
# SCSI scanner:
scsi EPSON
#
# Parallel port scanner:
#pio 0x278
#pio 0x378
#pio 0x3BC
#
# USB scanner - only enable this if you have an EPSON scanner. It could
# otherwise block your non-EPSON scanner from being
# recognized.
# Depending on your distribution, you may need either the
# first or the second entry.
#usb /dev/usbscanner0
usb /dev/usb/scanner0

but when I try the $ iscan command I still get the "could not sent command to scanner"

and I still can't find or understand the relevance of the "libusb:001:002" bit

Any idea's please?

regards

John

Never heard of "iscan" before, but it sounds like it may be a permissions problem. Try running it as root, just to see if that works (I don't recommend you do your scanning as root, this is just a test to see if the problem is that you don't have permission to write to the device). Assuming it works as root, then you need to follow the directions on the page you pointed me to and change the persmissions and owner of the device so that your login belongs to group "scanner" and group "scanner" has permission to use the device.

Hope that works!

This may or may not help. The current issue of Linux Journal Magazine April 2003 has a story on Scanning with Sane, VueSan, Image Scan (Epson), XSane, QuiteInsane. It also has a comparison chart on these Linux Scanner Front Ends. It tells you how to configure Sane.

If you have a usb scanner you need to have the scanner module loaded before you can use it, do "modprobe scanner" and then try the sane tests again.

It looks like i'll have to try and find a copy of the "linux journal"!

And with Aussie's suggestion - this is one of the (many) things that is confusing the hell out of me.

If I modprobe scanner (with or without the vendor and product ID's) as expected, I get returned to the # root prompt.

If I then do lsmod to see what modules are running/loaded, I get

[root@localhost john]# lsmod
Module Size Used by Tainted: P
scanner 9140 0 (unused)
<snip for brevity>
usbcore 58304 1 [scanner usb-uhci]
</snip>
[root@localhost john]#

and I don't follow why the scanner module shows as unused, but the device itself is shown at usbcore.

Also, I don't understand why I can't open xsane to see if I can configure it - it would appear that the scanner has to be pointed at "it" first telling "it" that "i'm here".

Iscan is the open source/gpl scanning software offered as direct support from http://www.epkowa.co.jp/english/linux_e/linux.html]epson[/URL]. And I "think" that I managed to do the "scanner and scanner group" thing correctly - how can I check? and which/how would I sort out the possible permissions problem?

Oh, and before I forget, it seems that the epson 1260 is supported by the plustek-sane-0.45-5 version. I have down loaded this as plustek-sane-0.45-5.tar.gz and untarred it with xzvf, but I can't remember what else I have to do with it ? (a classic example of rpm induced stupidity)

Any ideas?

regards

John

Modprobe only returns something if loading the module fails, the output of lsmod is correct, now edit the sane epson.conf, restart sane and try xsane.

> I "think" that I managed to do the "scanner and scanner group" thing correctly - how can I check? and which/how would I sort out the possible permissions problem?

Try it as root. If it works as root, abut not as you, you have a permissions problem.

# epson.conf
#
# here are some examples for how to configure the EPSON backend
#
# SCSI scanner:
# scsi EPSON
#
# Parallel port scanner:
#pio 0x278
#pio 0x378
#pio 0x3BC
#
# USB scanner - only enable this if you have an EPSON scanner. It could
# otherwise block your non-EPSON scanner from being
# recognized.
# Depending on your distribution, you may need either the
# first or the second entry.
#usb /dev/usbscanner0
usb /dev/usb/scanner0

This is what the epson.conf looks like. I have tried changing the line that is commented out for usb /dev etc etc, but even with logging out/in again to see if that affects the changes makes any difference, but nothing. Still the xsane licence agreement followed by a "no xsane devices" dialogue.

How do I finish of installing the "plustek backend" as mentioned my last post? As maybe that makes a difference?

regards

John

OK, I didn't realize that this is NOT an Epson scanner, it's a rebranded Plustek scanner. I'm afraid there I can't help you. Changing the epson config file did nothing because you're not using the epson backend. I don't know how to configure the plustek backend. I came across http://www.linux-france.org/article/...on1260-en.html but don't know if it's relevant or even helpful. Sorry.

You might try starting a new thread in this discussion board mentioning it's the plustek backend, since someone who has the answer who starts reading this thread may assume it is about a 1650photo and not read any further.