Printing via network using the HP DeskJet 3650 fails
 

Hello people.

I'm having another frustrating problem. I can't print via our network printer (HP DeskJet 3650) which is connected to a WinXP PC on the network. My laptop is wireless connected to the network. My distribution is openSUSE 11.2 and I tried setting up the network printer via CUPS:

1. Went to http://localhost:631
2. Add Printer
3. Device: Windows Printing via SAMBA
4. Device URI: smb://UMBRELLA/SMOKE/HP3600
5. Make: HP
6. Model: HP DeskJet 3650, hpcups 3.9.8 (en)
7. Printer State: idle, accepting jobs, published.

Then clicked the "Print Test Page" button. At this point the printer actually starts making sounds.. the same sounds it makes when it's preparing to print something. But then, it stops. The printing job is still present in the printer queue at the WinXP PC, but it won't print.

So I looked at this documentation: http://www.linuxfoundation.org/colla...sdocumentation

Step 2 from this documentation tells me to install a PPD file.. which I can't find anywhere. It's not on the original HP driver CD, neither can it be downloaded from this page: http://www.openprinting.org/show_pri...P-DeskJet_3650.

Also, I believe I have everything installed:
So, I think I'm stuck. Can someone please help me?

This printer should work with the hplip driver. I don't see any need for a ppd file.

The only things I see from your post are, the device URI. As far as I know, you would need the system hostname, or its IP address, and the printer name separated by a '/'. You seem to have two fields, UMBERELLA and SMOKE. Could you try the IP address in place of this, followed by the printer name and give it a try?

If you use names, you need /etc/hosts up to date with the host name and IP address.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the reply.

Our workgroup is called 'UMBRELLA' and the system hostname is 'SMOKE'. So that's where that URI comes from.

I changed the device URI:
smb://192.168.1.12/HP3600

But I get the same results as mentioned earlier. As soon as I send a print job, the new print job is added to the printer queue (on WinXP) and the printer starts making noises, as if it's preparing to print.. but then it stops and nothing comes out.

The hplip drivers you have installed are not the latest. I don't know if it would help or not, but the latest version is 3.9.12. It might be worth the effort to install the latest.

A link -->http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/gethplip.html

I just installed the latest hplip, version 3.9.12.

I went through the whole installation process and everything went fine. This time I directly connected the printer to my laptop via USB. In CUPS I added a local printer and selected the right driver from the list. Now, everything works fine. The test page came out fine and I am able to print from Linux.

Now, I disconnected the printer and reconnect it to the WinXP computer. I added a new network printer, using the same settings as before (except the printer driver is now "HP Deskjet 3650, hpcups 3.9.12"). CUPS recognized the printer as before. But when I try to print anything, the same thing happens again, where the printer would make noises, but nothing comes out :(

Hmmm, strange. Since the printer works connected to linux, you have the correct driver installed. This leads me to believe your problem is on the XP system.

Things I would try....

Delete the printer on XP, and re-install it. That should clean up any junk left around the print queues. Make sure you are using the driver supplied by HP, not some driver by microbucks.

Hope this helps...

No, I think this is where you went wrong.

The printer is connected to a win PC. Win has the driver.

Use CUPS to create a new networked printer, but this time do not select a driver, just set it to type "Raw Printer". Cups will send the data to win, which will put it through win's driver, and send it to the printer.

That should work.

Edit: Or maybe not. The above instructions (Raw Printer) apply to a networked printer being driven by CUPS (ie connected to a linux PC).

For printing to win-connected printers over the network, I think you have to use samba, about which I know very little, but please see here:
http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Debian-and-Win...o_windows.html
/Edit

Thanks again for your comments guys. I appreciate it.

Well, that's exactly what I have to do every time I send a print job to the printer. The job gets stuck on the printer queue on WinXP and we're no longer able to print anything (because the printer hangs because of that job). So, in WinXP, I have to stop the spool server (net stop spool), then manually remove all the printer jobs from "%systemroot%\system32\spool\printers\", and then start the spool server again (net start spooler). After this the printer queue on WinXP is empty and we're able to print again.

I tested it, but this indeed doesn't work.

I think this has the same result as adding a printer via CUPS (when selecting Device: Windows Printing via SAMBA). Because after following the steps on that page, a new printer with almost the same settings was added to the CUPS page. I say "almost", because the method described on that page didn't really work because of the following reasons:
- I need the PPD file, which I don't have (see my first post). So a 'raw' printer was added instead.
- And on my suse box there is no command '/usr/bin/enable'. A 'whereis enable' returns no results. So I had to enable the printer using the "Start Printer" button in CUPS.

After this the result is still the same. :(

One last thought, have you looked into printer settings, on both systems? ie paper size etc? Often the linux side will default to A4 paper size, and may cause the print spool to choke. Just a thought...

On WinXP the default paper size is A4. On Linux this was set to Letter. So I changed this in the CUPS printer options:
Media Size: A4

All other options seem to be correct and are also the same as the local printer profile (which worked). So the options should be ok now. But still no improvement.

Thanks for you help so far camorri.

EDIT: Anyone else have an idea on how to get my printer working?

I have the same problem with an HP PSC 1315v, except I have the ppd file. This worked for me:
-right click your printer in XP the "Printers and Faxes" window and click "Properties"
-under the "Ports" tab make sure "Enable Bidirectional Support" is NOT checked.

Hope it works for you :)

Your fix worked! I'm so glad I can finally send print jobs to a Windows machine.
Thanks jp40684 for providing the fix!