I always thought that as time has gone by, driver support for GNU/Linux (barring a few troublesome manufacturers like ATI, Lexmark, etc.) has been fairly good. What kind of drivers are you talking about that should be sold on CDs?
If you're talking about driver CDs like you have for motherboards, mice, etc then that's the manufacturer's headache. Generally every distro that is released has up-to-date drivers for the latest hardware (provided they're stable). What more are you looking for?
Although it may appear so, it is not so simple always. Acer is one manufacturer whose hardware is always troublesome on GNU/Linux. It might be Acer's fault that they ship non-standard H/W, but I feel the FOSS world needs to do something about this. I have seen 4 Acer systems, all laptops. One whose battery was not detected, one had trouble with its Wifi, one had trouble with both its CD-ROM and Wifi, and one has issues with the sound-card.
None of these are highly sophisticated H/W (imagine trouble with CD-ROM).
Cheers, Debarshi
On 06/08/06 09:25 +0530, Debarshi 'Rishi' Ray wrote: <snip>
systems, all laptops. One whose battery was not detected, one had
Laptops *are* closed systems. The laptop market still isn't as componentised as the PC market (even if you get a chassis, the motherboard and monitor come prefitted, and you simply can't replace components the way it was possible with PCs).
trouble with its Wifi, one had trouble with both its CD-ROM and Wifi, and one has issues with the sound-card.
None of these are highly sophisticated H/W (imagine trouble with CD-ROM).
I would just have returned those as defective. *If it doesn't work, return it*. Your problem was most likely with the motherboard though.
Devdas Bhagat
On Sunday 06 August 2006 13:22, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
Laptops *are* closed systems. The laptop market still isn't as componentised as the PC market (even if you get a chassis, the motherboard and monitor come prefitted, and you simply can't replace components the way it was possible with PCs).
It is important to mention here that even though laptops are "closed", standard stuff works out of the box. For example, intel based laptops hardly ever have problems running linux lest you're using their most bleeding edge h/w.
I would like add another angle to this drivers debate - the need for good diagnostic tools for the hardware. Case in point being my hp 3325.
Ubuntu configured it perfectly, even to the point of using it in strictly gray scale (no color at all) mode - something I couldn't figure out to do in win32. But a few days back, it developed problems in moving the cartridges and ultimately broke the belt that moved the cartridge cradle to and fro. The neighborhood computer guy replaced the belt but the problem persisted - the cradle simply wasn't moving. He guessed that maybe the color cartridge was the culprit (given my penchant for b/w prints) and asked me to boot into win32... viola! There was a window saying the cradle was being obstructed! He immediately removed the color cartridge and all went to normal.
Could this (the pop-ups that are generated by the HP Printer Assistant) have been possibly developed in Linux also? Or is it proprietary?
On 8/6/06, Rohit V Bhute rvbhute@gmail.com wrote:
I would like add another angle to this drivers debate - the need for good diagnostic tools for the hardware. Case in point being my hp 3325.
The 3325 (my printer since 2 years now) had been difficult to configure and was also much slower in Linux compared to Windows. The installation complexity for printers in general has reduced over time, but it still isn't good enough I guess.
Could this (the pop-ups that are generated by the HP Printer Assistant) have been possibly developed in Linux also? Or is it proprietary?
HP provides support for Linux with it's HPIJS (and later HPLIP) printer driver and tools. HPLIP also has a diagnostic tool for HP printers which will help you do stuff like clean cartridges, calibrate the printer, etc.
If you notice none of the popups that are on windows (paper jam, empty tray, ink level warning, etc.) appear on GNU/Linux. That is because printing often takes place through a generic interface (lpr, cups) and the behaviour needs to be consistent across all printers. It's not impossible though. It will probably require another layer/tool that will listen for these messages from the printer and according to its make, decipher and display the message to the user.
Siddhesh
Siddhesh Poyarekar wrote:
installation complexity for printers in general has reduced over time, but it still isn't good enough I guess.
Almost painless I would say - select port, manufacturer and model - its done.
HP provides support for Linux with it's HPIJS (and later HPLIP)
In the driver dropdown, it shows 'hpijs (recommended) HPLIP (suggested)'. I did get to customize it to print only grayscale, which is more than what I could do in win32.
printer driver and tools. HPLIP also has a diagnostic tool for HP printers which will help you do stuff like clean cartridges, calibrate the printer, etc.
Will look for those.
On 06/08/06 15:18 +0530, Rohit V Bhute wrote: <snip>
Could this (the pop-ups that are generated by the HP Printer Assistant) have been possibly developed in Linux also? Or is it proprietary?
If your printer supports SNMP, that would work just fine. I have never had trouble from network printers, laserjets and dot matrix printers. Inkjets, OTOH, ...
Devdas Bhagat
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Debarshi 'Rishi' Ray -
Devdas Bhagat -
Dinesh Joshi -
Rohit V Bhute -
Siddhesh Poyarekar