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tomk

Forum Fellow

From: Ireland

Registered: 2004-07-21

Posts: 9,839

2 HP printers - Deskjet works, Photosmart doesn't - SOLVED

To expand a little - I'm trying to set up CUPS for local printing only, with two HPs - a Deskjet 940C and a Photosmart 420. Both get a 3-tux Perfect score at LinuxPrinting.org. I've installed hplip, and set everything up according to the install guide. I can print a test page on the Deskjet, but when I try one on the Photosmart, nothing happens on the printer, CUPS says the job was aborted, and I see the following in /var/log/everything.log:

Dec 21 12:45:45 tk-i5ka drivers/usb/class/usblp.c: usblp0: failed reading printer status
Dec 21 12:45:45 tk-i5ka hpiod: unable to read Device::GetDeviceStatus: Input/output error

There's also a problem with hp-toolbox - could be related to the above, I don't know. When I run it, it says "No HP printers found", or words to that effect - even though hp-info seems to identify the printers correctly.

Anyone seen stuff like this before? Any suggestions?

Jacob

Member

Registered: 2005-03-19

Posts: 52

Re: 2 HP printers - Deskjet works, Photosmart doesn't - SOLVED

I'm unsure about the first part of you problem.  But the part about the hptoolbox saying "No HP printers found", is something that I too experience.

However, despite this problem, the HP Deskjet printer I have work with CUPS and the hp driver.

I suspect your two problems aren't related.

As for the first problem if you are getting an "Input/Output" error, there is something with the hardware.  Could be printer, usb port, or cable...

Jacob

tomk

Forum Fellow

From: Ireland

Registered: 2004-07-21

Posts: 9,839

Re: 2 HP printers - Deskjet works, Photosmart doesn't - SOLVED

Thanks Jacob. I'm not particularly concerned about the hp-toolbox fault - I only mentioned it in case it had any relevance to the Photosmart situation.

I was hoping to avoid installing HP's CD full of bloat on Windoze, but I eventually gave in and did it, and guess what - my hardware is fine. Port, external hub, cable, printer - all working fine, printing out perfect Windoze test pages - extremely annoying in the circumstances, but at least I don't have to bring the thing back to PC World.

I think I'll head over to the hplip forum with this one, although naturally I'd be most grateful if you or anyone else can suggest anything further.

tomk

Forum Fellow

From: Ireland

Registered: 2004-07-21

Posts: 9,839

Re: 2 HP printers - Deskjet works, Photosmart doesn't - SOLVED

It's working now, and it was totally down to me - a typical PEBKAC caused by not RTFM (actually, RTFFAQ in this case).

The printer does one size only - 4x6 inches. The FAQ says:

For printers that only support 4x6 page sizes, make sure the page size setting is correct in the CUPS queue. The default page setting may not be correct
   and print jobs will fail.

The default page setting in CUPS was Custom Size - 4x6 is next in the list. All I had to do was change it. :oops:

Well, you live and learn (very slowly, in my case  ).