Hello There,

I'm planning to by a new printer for Home use.
but after checking many website about printers compatibility, I can't find any of the following printers:
- Canon PIXMA MP 270
- Epson STYLUS SX115
- Epson STYLUS SX215
- Epson STYLUS SX415
- Epson BX300F
- Hewlett Packard DESKJET F2480
- Hewlett Packard PHOTOSMART C4680
- Hewlett Packard DESKJET F4580 (I found that the C4580 is working on ubuntu 9.10 but I don't know about the F4580)
- Hewlett Packard PHOTOSMART B109A
- Hewlett Packard C5290

I would preferably go for an HP as it seems to be more reliable than the other brand and more compatible as well, What do you think?
Any one have a recommendation and/or experiences with one of these printers?

Any advice will be appreciated.
Thank you for your time
Angel


PS: Here are the websites I've already checked:
- https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupp...onentsPrinters
- http://www.linuxquestions.org/hcl/index.php/cat/198

My current OS is Ubuntu 9.04

In the open source world, it often takes several months to a year or more for drivers to be added for new peripherals (assuming it can be done at all). This is a simple side-effect of having to reverse-engineer the interface to the device in order to write it. The process goes much faster if the company producing the device directly helps in development or releases enough specification information to allow others to do it.

Have you checked out the openprinting database yet? That's the most comprehensive source of printer information. The link's in my signature. In general, it seems that HP is one of the best-supported brands, and Canon is one of the least linux-friendly, although they do produce proprietary drivers for some models. Epson falls in-between. They produce their own proprietary drivers (see the avasys sig link), and the gutenprint driver generally adds support for them within a few months. Finally, there's the for-cost turboprint driver, which appears to have good support for most Epson and Canon models, and a decent selection of HP too, with new models added fairly quickly.

Edit: I see your list is mostly for all-in-ones, which means that you'll need scanner drivers also. Just about everything I said above applies to them too. Just check the sane link below. Note also that the sane epson backend can generally handle unlisted as well as listed models at a basic level, although only their proprietary driver gives you access to their full scan range. The proprietary vuescan driver seems very nice, although I've only played with the free test version a little.

1 members found this post helpful.

Why not start at the other end...

The better procedure for you might be to start with the printers that are well supported. HP has provided drivers for many of their machines in the HPLIP project.

A driver for an all-in-one will include scanner function, but there is no support for a stand alone scanner.

http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/index.html

http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web...ces/index.html

If you want a separate scanner, you might try an older model such as a Canon Lide 20 or Lide 30 model.

I would avoid the all-in-one models (personal hangup).

Best Linux support is HP, Epson is a close second

Best Photo printers are Epson.

Better beware of the Canon printers, they may well give you a nice headache. HPs have worked so far for me, no complaints. All-in-ones have worked just well, scanning and all. Can't say much about photo printing, I do my prints (when doing digital) at a photo store.

Here is a quick feedback.

I've bought a HP PHOTOSMART B109N and it working fine (printing a scanning) using the driver provided by HP. Only the memory slot of the printer is not accessible, apart from that, no complain and I'm fairly happy with this printer (so far)

Thanks for your advices

I recently bought a HP deskjet F4280 and it works great! The only things I would wish that would be better is waking up the printer when the OS tries to printer and also using the scan button on the printer to open up a scanning application.

If anyone can help me get this working please post here! I'd be very grateful! (I'm using Ubuntu but anything would help!)

I'm not sure about where to get printers in France but this site has Linux printers reviewed by Linux users. I haven't been able to find any other stores offering only Linux printers..

Thanks!

The Hewlett Packard C5290 for sure will work.

Most HP printers should work anyway, the support is usually very good. Epson also has good support, but I can't say for sure if any of those will work. Canon has poor support, if you don't know for sure that it will work, don't try.

Also check:
http://www.openprinting.org/printers