Hello LQ!

I'm pretty new here, having just very recently made the leap from windows ( :-O ) to Linux Mint. I'm currently in the process of getting things working that worked before in windows, and I'm obviously on a HUGE learning curve, so I'm like a newbie poking about the shell, everything is unfamiliar. Anyway, to my current problem.

I have a Lexmark E330 laser printer, which is connected via parallel port to my PC (the USB is on the fritz), and I realised today when I went to print something, it wasn't set up. I tried the printers control panel first, and couldn't add a printer cos it didn't even see the parallel port. Some googling ensued, and some terminal poking about involving LSMOD, grep, Modprobe (i think this was the command that fixed it) and localhost 631 in the browser, and suddenly the port appeared, along with my printer.

Only problem, I downloaded the software lexmark recommended, but cannot find my exact model in the list! I plumped for the nearest model I could find in the same family of printers, the E230 driver, there seems to be about 5 different versions, I've tried the PCL5 HPLJ4 some pxlmono driver, anyway All fail. First I got some filter failed error, changing drivers got it to sitting processing in the job queue, but it just sits there, and never prints.

Being a newbie, I'm now stuck! I have no idea where its falling over, or how the print subsystem is set up and interacts. I can see CUPS seems to be in overall control (is it equivalent to the windows print spooler?) but i've no idea how the rest all tie together.

Help? :-D

Thanks

Lesley

This link from the Open Printing database may help. It's about the E320, but there's a good chance it applies to the E330. http://www.openprinting.org/printer/...k/Lexmark-E320

Lexmark's Linux support, for all their protestations, is less than desirable.

I did a web search, and the best I could find is this.

You've done well to get as far as you did.

1) You can get a better idea of what is failing by putting CUPS in to debug mode with
Try to print a test page, and examine /var/log/messages/error_log for errors. If you need help with analysing the output, you can upload to http://pastebin.com/ and post the link that it generates here.

2) Since you're connected by parallel port, I wonder if there is an issue here. you might want to check the BIOS parallel port settings eg ECP/EPP. BTW, how is the printer reported by the following?
3) You could try using another driver. This E330 blog might be helpful to you. It suggests that the printer is PCL5e compatible, and the writer chose 'Generic PCL Laser Printer'. I note that CUPS offers 'Generic PCL 5e Printer CUPS + Gutenprint' and I have foomatic drivers as well.

You've done well to get as far as you did.

1) You can get a better idea of what is failing by putting CUPS in to debug mode with
Try to print a test page, and examine /var/log/messages/error_log for errors. If you need help with analysing the output, you can upload to http://pastebin.com/ and post the link that it generates here.

2) Since you're connected by parallel port, I wonder if there is an issue here. you might want to check the BIOS parallel port settings eg ECP/EPP. BTW, how is the printer reported by the following?
3) You could try using another driver. This E330 blog might be helpful to you. It suggests that the printer is PCL5e compatible, and the writer chose 'Generic PCL Laser Printer'. I note that CUPS offers 'Generic PCL 5e Printer CUPS + Gutenprint' and I have foomatic drivers as well.

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Hi:

After going to the Lexmark website I found out that they only have a linux driver for your printer if your running Debian, Red Hat or Open Suse.

http://support.lexmark.com/index?pag...serlocale=EN#2

http://support.lexmark.com/index?pag...dor=LINUX_UNIX

The driver for Debian (might) work with your LM but I'm not sure; you'd have to install it and try.
http://www.nodevice.com/download/dri...52/417693.html
<or> here:
https://us.driverscollection.com/?H=...xmark&SS=Linux

-::-Since the cable to the printer is on the fritz maybe pick up a new cable from your local pc store or order one from Lexmark.-::-

Maybe other members that have Lexmark printers will see your thread and chime in.

I have a lexmark printer. No linux compatibility at all. And even the windows drivers are hit and miss. I think the windows driver worked once when it was initially installed. And then never again. Granted that it's been a few years since I've tried. Mostly it's a photo copier not connected to any computer these days. And it's not so good at that either. Model x5470.

No listing for yours here:

http://www.openprinting.org/printers...turer/Lexmark/

A listing for mine. Under paperweight. There is a hit for e320, perhaps partially compatible?

http://www.openprinting.org/printer/...k/Lexmark-E320

No compatability; jeesseez, that stinks.
Have you been able to get your Lexmark to work with Cups (front end and backend) or Xsane?

Wow! Quick response folks!

First, I don't think the E320 driver will do, everything I've found in the past about this printer has it in a family with the E230, E232, E330(mine) and E332n which is the network capable version of mine. Thats why I was tempted with the E230 driver, rather than the E320, but I suppose there is no harm in trying it.

@ferrari Top Instructions! I think you've helped me find the problem, though I'm still not 100% sure how to fix it. I didn't want to post the whole log, it's huge! but here I think is the relevant part from trying to print a test page. :

It looks like it can't find the pscript5.dll (probably related to the fact I tried PCL5e driver first). Also I see lots of entries mentioning "No Authentication data provided", so could there be a permissions problem? Also seen mention of "Dirty files", so i'm not sure if i've maybe messed something up with my fiddling?

I couldn't seem to do anything with parallel, in terminal it would just go back to prompt, even tried that as SU, no success.

lpinfo gave this output.

So does this mean the lpt port isn't set up right? that would explain things.

Oh and forgot to mention, in BIOS it'll be set to ECP, I always set parallel ports to ECP, unless theres a specific reason not to. To put you in the picture, I've years of experience of repairing and building computer hardware, and doing windows and server installs Mostly Wintel based. So it's only the linux specific stuff I'm going to be like a noob on.

Thanks for all the help and links so far. You all are awesome!

Edit forgot to add @Ztcoracat, the lexmark website was my first port of call, and I tried loading the .deb related to the E330, it popped up the synaptic package manager, and installed, but after that, no printer. Thats when I started finding stuff about the CUPS localhost thingy, the port missing, and doing the initial terminal stuff. But I am still fumbling in the dark a bit. I think the only terminal commands i've got to grips with is SU, sudo, cd, ls, lsmod. The rest I have still to learn. Talking of which, is there a shell command reference anywhere, where I could learn all the shell commands and switches?

Thanks again.

Did you reboot after Synaptic installed the .deb pkg?

You can use the man pages to learn commands.
For example if you wanted to learn how to use the modprobe command you'd type:
A description and synopses will open in the terminal that you can read through.
-:::-Can be tedious and hard to understand.-:::-

These cheat sheets are pretty useful.-
https://www.cheatography.com/davechi...-command-line/
http://linoxide.com/linux-command/li...s-cheat-sheet/

Learning the Shell is your best bet-
http://linuxcommand.org/learning_the_shell.php

1 members found this post helpful.

You could use dpkg to list the files in the .deb and see if something isn't quite expected.

$ dpkg -c file.deb

Perhaps there's /usr/bin/... stuff to setup the printer. Or the /usr/lib/ stuff is 32 bit only and therefor needs that compatibility or even a pure 32 bit install. To better the odds.

Thanks for the links and man instructions Ztcoracat. Also, actually I didn't reboot come to think of it, I had the computer in sleep mode rather than off. I'll try a reboot later today. I've chucked it in for the night, in bed now.

And Shadow 7, you may have touched on a point. If the linux driver is 32bit, will it work on a 64 bit system. I know in windows that could sometimes be an issue.

Night folks. To be continued tomorrow.

Yes, you have it set up as a serial printer it would seem, although that might be just due to a serial port present perhaps?

Then no printer is found. You need to make sure that lp and parport modules are loaded. (There are ways to automate this later if needed.)
To load manually do
It will load the lp module and dependent modules (eg parport, ppdev, parport_pc)

See if the CUPS parallel backend then discovers the printer
You can't proceed further until you can get as far as this.

If the printer is enumerated, then go back to CUPS web utility check/modify configuration
http://localhost:631/admin

1 members found this post helpful.

You're Welcome-

You can also checked to see if that pkg is installed with:
if it's installed the output in the terminal will tell you so.

Yes, that appears to be associated with samba printing eg cupsaddsmb (CUPS server for windoes clients support)where various Windows .dll files are required for printing

http://linux.die.net/man/8/cupsaddsmb

Not relevant here though. I would remove any existing printer configuration and start over. BTW, the printer configuration is /etc/cups/printers.conf, and associated PPD files in /etc/cups/ppd directory.

OOOKKKKKK! I rebooted, went into the printer admin panel, looked a properties, and clicked the test page button, and BANG! got a hard hang. So I've rebooted again.

Thats the output of the 3 commands @ferrari.

@Ztcoracat

so it seems that package in particular is not installed. I'm not sure it WOULD be installed though, since i'm running the 64 bit version of Mint. wouldn't we be looking for x86_64?

I just tried modprobe lp, then lpinfo -v, and there is still no sign of the parallel port, just serial and network stuff. I think this is the first problem. SO, how do we diagnose the parallel port, and get it working from inital boot. (remember I need my hand held here, I really do not know the linux boot process, or where drivers are held, or conf files etc. )

Thanks again for the awesome help.

Edit : just thought, it may help you to know that in the printer properties, the Device URI is parallel:/dev/lp0