Hello, first of all: I am not at all an expert regarding photo printing (at home I use an online photo printing service for my photos). On Feb 11 14:23 Daniel Bauer wrote (shortened):

... Epson Stylus Photo printers.

Regarding Linux support for Epson Stylus Photo printers see http://gutenprint.sourceforge.net/ because the Gutenprint driver is THE standard driver for Epson non-PostScript printers. Unfortunately http://gutenprint.sourceforge.net/p_Supported_Printers.php does not provide detailed information which quality the Gutenprint driver provides for which model so that you should also have a look at http://www.openprinting.org/printer_list.cgi?make=Epson and http://openprinting.org/show_driver.cgi?driver=gutenprint to get some more information. Note that some data there is not verified and/or proofread. Sometimes there are additional user comments for a model, e.g. http://openprinting.org/show_printer.cgi?recnum=Epson-Stylus_Photo_RX700 "Colours poor, banding and incorrect colours in the test print wheel" Therefore not all Epson Stylus Photo printers work well out of the box. The reason is that for each different model the Gutenprint driver default values must be manually fine-tuned by the Gutenprint developers to get good out-of-the-box results which is a lot of work and requires that at least one Gutenprint developer owns the exact model. Otherwise the Gutenprint driver default values can be only a best-guess and then it is the end-user who must do the manual fine-tuning on his own. Kind Regards Johannes Meixner -- SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, Maxfeldstrasse 5, 90409 Nuernberg, Germany AG Nuernberg, HRB 16746, GF: Markus Rex -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

lynn skrev:

On Thursday 11 February 2010 15:23:28 Johannes Meixner wrote:

...

Hello,

first of all: I am not at all an expert regarding photo printing (at home I use an online photo printing service for my photos).

On Feb 11 14:23 Daniel Bauer wrote (shortened):

...

... Epson Stylus Photo printers. Regarding Linux support for Epson Stylus Photo printers see http://gutenprint.sourceforge.net/ because the Gutenprint driver is THE standard driver for Epson non-PostScript printers.

Unfortunately http://gutenprint.sourceforge.net/p_Supported_Printers.php does not provide detailed information which quality the Gutenprint driver provides for which model so that you should also have a look at http://www.openprinting.org/printer_list.cgi?make=Epson and http://openprinting.org/show_driver.cgi?driver=gutenprint to get some more information. Note that some data there is not verified and/or proofread.

Sometimes there are additional user comments for a model, e.g. http://openprinting.org/show_printer.cgi?recnum=Epson-Stylus_Photo_RX700 "Colours poor, banding and incorrect colours in the test print wheel"

Therefore not all Epson Stylus Photo printers work well out of the box. The reason is that for each different model the Gutenprint driver default values must be manually fine-tuned by the Gutenprint developers to get good out-of-the-box results which is a lot of work and requires that at least one Gutenprint developer owns the exact model. Otherwise the Gutenprint driver default values can be only a best-guess and then it is the end-user who must do the manual fine-tuning on his own.

Kind Regards Johannes Meixner

Thanks Johannes

I can see that this is going to be a long one;-) Love L x

I use the EPSON R2400 with Turboprint (German sw, costs a few euros). VERY good results. Just my ten cents :-) -- ------------------------------ Med venlig hilsen/Best regards Verner Kjærsgaard Open Source Academy +45 56964223 Novell Certified Linux Professional 10035701 Linux Counter no 114954 ------------------------------ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 02/11/2010 10:08 AM, lynn wrote:

On Thursday 11 February 2010 16:01:34 Verner Kjærsgaard wrote:

...

I use the EPSON R2400 with Turboprint (German sw, costs a few euros). VERY good results. Just my ten cents :-)

Thanks Verner. slow but sure I'm getting there. L x

I use Turboprint as well it supports a lot of Cannon , HP, Brother and Epson printers. For some it even gives a higher resolution than the windows drivers that comes with the printer It is a great program for printing photos. http://www.turboprint.info/ -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice; In practice, there is Robert Cunningham Sr. Physics Laboratory Coordinator /RSO -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Thursday 11 February 2010 12:46:35 pm Carlos E. R. wrote:

On Thursday, 2010-02-11 at 12:58 -0500, Robert Cunningham wrote:

...

On 02/11/2010 10:08 AM, lynn wrote:

I use Turboprint as well it supports a lot of Cannon , HP, Brother and Epson printers. For some it even gives a higher resolution than the windows drivers that comes with the printer It is a great program for printing photos. http://www.turboprint.info/

It is indeed a good solution. My previous Canon did not print well with the opensource drivers, I had to use TP. It is worth the small price.

However, now I use a laser color printer (HP cp1515n). It is not cheap, but works out of the box and the final price per photo (not including paper) seems to be good (I still do not know how many pages per toner cartridge). A non networked model should come cheaper, but a network model is sure to have postcript support, which is the safest way to know that it will work in linux. Max resolution is 600 dpi, but the result is really impressive: I think they manage to adjust the per pixel intensity of color, instead of having to add more or less pixels at top intensity at a higher resolution.

And I no longer have to clean heads :-)

I too use a color laser printer (Xerox Phaser 6120) {was $399. on sale from Xerox). Have no tried many color photos because you need to make sure it will take the heat from the fuser. I do use a Glossy Xerox paper, 98 brightness (104 European), 28 LB/bond. Pictures come out as good as photo paper. Toner was expensive (3-color, 1 blk cartridges) until I found a local printer repair shop that is also a Xerox authorized shop. Now my cartridge get refilled as High Capacity instead of buying standard capacity ones. Cost is less than 1/2 Xerox price for standard cartridges. Quality is same since ink shop uses come direct from Xerox and they also replace the counter chip as part of the service at no charge. It also has options of DISK, Additional Memory, Dual-Sided printing and Second paper tray. I only have the memory upgrade, but bought the memory and installed it my self. (memory is from Crucial -(Micron)) I've had it for 3 1/2 years with no problems. Ink is rated at 4500 copies/ high capacity cartridges. Duty cycle is 20,000 copies per month. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 12 February 2010 10:51:25, Johannes Meixner wrote:

I think it is better to keep the 2596,14 Euros for 9 of the 10 sets of replacement cartridges on a bank account so that it can yield interest ;-)

ehm, do you know a bank where the interests on 2596,14 Euros are higher than the bank charges? Then, especially in Germany, consider the taxes you have to pay on your assets of 2596,14 Euros (if you don't declare it, some Swiss guy will put your name on an CD and sell it to your gov), while on the other hand you could amortize the costs for your printer... and, just in case, don't bring your money to UBS. It's most likely that the printers initial ink cartridges last longer than that bank. Or is that just wishful thinking? scnr Daniel -- Daniel Bauer photographer Basel Barcelona professional photography: http://www.daniel-bauer.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 2010-02-12 10:51, Johannes Meixner wrote:

Hello,

On Feb 11 21:46 Carlos E. R. wrote (shortened):

...

... I use a laser color printer (HP cp1515n)

Just for fun an example how one could calculate printing costs (i.e. the costs for a printed page) according to information what HP provides on their German web pages:

Their HP Color LaserJet CP1510 model web page reads 249 Euros for the printer which has 4 so called "Starter" toner cartridges included which last up to 750 printed pages according to the "ISO/IEC 19798" standard so that one "ISO/IEC 19798" printed page costs about 33 Euro Cent (without the money for the plain paper).

Their supplies web page reads 76,99 Euros for the black toner replacement cartridge which last up to 2200 printed pages and there times 70,49 Euros for each of the cyan, yellow, and magenta toner replacement cartridges which last up to 1400 pages.

Interesting info indeed. I suspected as much, that the starter cartridge lasts shorter, but I was unable to find definitive info in the hp site. I thought that both types lasted 800 pages. However, I have only spent one black cartridge, and it did about 1300 pages. Colour is "officially" about half spent. The info page at my printer reads at this moment: supply level part pages remaining Black Cartridge 90% CB540A 1936 Cyan Cartridge 42% CB541A 475 Magenta Cartridge 39% CB543A 475 Yellow Cartridge 41% CB542A 476 Therefore, your info is correct. However, your prices are not: I googled a bit, and found toner replacement at 48.42€ (56.17 with taxes). It is curious indeed, but I knew this already: http://www.tonerspain.es/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=CB541A&gclid=CNeptI_J7Z8CFVpb4wodZXSWXg http://www.shopmania.es/compras~online-consumibles~compra-hp-cb541a~p-739653... (one of the listed places has a price higher than hp itself (unless the taxes misleads me) >:-) ) Could it be that those places sell cartridges that don't last 2200 pages? The black above is from HP, bought together with the printer as an special offer (for black only). The replacement stack at home I bought somewhere else. If I finally discover they contain less toner you will hear me grumble as far as the North Pole >:-) Anyway, even if toner is expensive, it turns cheaper in time spent (MY TIME!) to get my previous printer running each time. Cleaning, testing, more cleaning, refilling, cleaning again... hours. And spent aka lost ink in the process. Toner does not dry on the head nozzle, quality is stable for months... True, I don't usually print photos, mostly text with some figures. Another interesting detail is that the page counter on the printer counts down to zero and stays there, so that the several hundred pages I printed above the limit are not counted. So I wonder if "something" could be attached to cups and do a real count of printed pages, till the user manually resets the counter. And printing above the limit needs overriding a control on the printer itself, it is impossible to do it via the printer control web page. Perhaps with the windows driver, that I don't use. I'd like to find the following "gadget" or wizzardry: 1) Count printed pages till reset, and across several printer queues that are attached to the same physical printer. This should not be too complex. 2) Estimate toner/ink spent, by counting number of pixels of each basic colour (and intensity). This can be very complex if accurate. What do you think?

Therfore it makes sense to buy initially the printer plus one set of replacement cartridges but it does not make much sense to buy initially the printer plus 10 sets of replacement cartridges because I think it is better to keep the 2596,14 Euros for 9 of the 10 sets of replacement cartridges on a bank account so that it can yield interest ;-)

ROTFL! And the printer could break down in that time, and the replacement printer would need a different cartridge. Murphy's laws, you know. Off you go with a stack of expensive contaminants at home! :-p Or the storage conditions could not be perfect, and the toner dust would fuse together and be useless. This is south Spain, temperatures of 40℃ are not that rare.

Of course the costs for A4 photo printouts are very much higher because the complete printable area of A4 paper is printed and good photo paper is much more expensive.

I have not tried photo paper with that printer, I use normal paper. The quality is surprisingly good, that toner is a bit shiny. Of course, I don't print full page.

...

And I no longer have to clean heads :-)

And in particular with a PostScript color laser printer you do no longer have to clean the brain in your own head from all those bizarre nightmares about never-ending troubles regarding how to tame whatever cheap printer beast ;-)

Absolutely! Of course, I went for a model that listed what I thought would be enough memory (96MiB, I think). On occasion I had to use the pcl? driver. The symptom is that cups sends the page to the printer, but this one remains silent, no clues. Then I send as pcl, I think, and goes fine, but the computer has to hum longer. - -- Cheers / Saludos, Carlos E. R. (from 11.2 x86_64 "Emerald" GM (Elessar)) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.12 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/ iEYEARECAAYFAkt1xCYACgkQU92UU+smfQXH2ACdGSfOKJB7qAlMZMep4FtLAbM5 Ez0An0Uva6jFLRIkJbl7fysE+hc5gEAc =U93h -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Tuesday, 2010-02-16 at 15:47 +0100, Johannes Meixner wrote:

Hello,

On Feb 12 22:12 Carlos E. R. wrote (shortened):

...

...

...

... I use a laser color printer (HP cp1515n) ... Another interesting detail is that the page counter on the printer counts down to zero and stays there, so that the several hundred pages I printed above the limit are not counted. So I wonder if "something" could be attached to cups and do a real count of printed pages

There is by default CUPS' software accounting which stores its best-effort/best-guess results into /var/log/cups/page_log For its file format see http://www.cups.org/documentation.php/doc-1.3/ref-page_log.html

Ah! Well, I can get a roughly accurate page count from there, by storing somewhere when I change cartridges. Quite rough, I'd have to take into acount two computers and several test/work partitions...

But software accounting cannot be really reliable, e.g. see http://otrs.librelogiciel.com/otrs/public.pl?Action=&ID=24

I understand that it is not easy to be accurate, I wanted an approximation. Anyway, my printer does not do double sided printing. It is a feature I'd like to have, but costs money. On largish jobs, I print the odd sides, put the paper back in, then the even sides.

In particular by printing in "raw" mode via something like cat printer_specific_data | lp -d queue_name -o raw any user can bypass all CUPS filtering and therefore also no software accounting program can be run in "raw" mode.

Not my case, but yes, one problem more.

Therefore for "a real count of printed pages" you need hardware accounting which is - as far as I know - only possible via SNMP for business network printers which maintain an internal reliably working page counter.

I have not investigated that. Anyway, my printer (if connected via network) has a web page that counts how many pages are printed by each cartridge. Or rather, how many pages remain - the problem is that when it gets to zero it does not keep counting the excess, so that next time you can not guess how long it should last.

But pages != sheets of paper so that when printing in duplex mode the counted number of pages is about two times the number of sheets of paper, see http://otrs.librelogiciel.com/otrs/public.pl?Action=&ID=32

More problems :-)

Furthermore even an internal reliably working page counter counts all pages but not "only pages with toner on it", see http://forums13.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?admit=109447627+1266330795845+28353475&threadId=347346

And more

For more details you may have a look at http://www.pykota.com/

Ah! And I see you made an rpm of it for 11.0 at least. I might try it, dunno, perhaps it is excesive. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkt7CNMACgkQtTMYHG2NR9WXiwCfbcwnPMj/YN9qzEz55x/m4s+5 2eYAnj7MKZasfImA+P2lyjJzs1QewFy2 =beOb -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Wednesday, 2010-02-17 at 10:50 +0100, Johannes Meixner wrote:

Hello,

On Feb 16 22:06 Carlos E. R. wrote (shortened):

...

...

For more details you may have a look at http://www.pykota.com/

Ah! And I see you made an rpm of it for 11.0 at least. I might try it,

Better ignore it because it requires a lot of other software around it so that it can work and I do not provide RPMs for all those other software so that you may end up with a nice new kind of headache regarding printing setup: "Set up a reliably working printer accounting solution!"

If you like to stay to be "a happy user", I recommend to avoid the printer accounting snakepit and be happy with the estimate page count in /var/log/cups/page_log

ROTFL! Understood :-) - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAkt8WQUACgkQtTMYHG2NR9UFBgCgkW05+cYIAqCDJmA9ZO8USEIa N0gAoJWfrKVg6l+o/Xe+zrSIR9YhdBrL =fuRr -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 12/02/10 00:23, Daniel Bauer wrote:

On Thursday 11 February 2010 13:16:27, lynn wrote:

...

Hi I have around 250 photos I'd like to print in colour on photo quality paper to around A4 size. The photos were take with a Nikon D40 at 3000x2000 resolution. After this the printer will be used simply to print openoffice text documents on standard A4 folios.

What printer would you recommend to do this? Can I do it wiithin a budget of 200 euros if I already have the paper?

On another thread I learned that my HP F2280 was not up to the task.

OS 11.2 under KDE 4.3.5.

Thanks. Lynn x

Lynn, I guess for approx. € 200 you should get quite a nice printer, but which printer is a matter of taste. I personally have very, very good experience with the Epson Stylus Photo printers. The one I use today is more than 5 years old. Never had any problems to use it with Linux. Besides of the printing results I also prefer Epson over HP because of the sound, HPs are very loud with a lot of "klack klack"... (but again: personal opinion only).

Ink is not cheap, though. Quality photo printing needs a lot of ink.

Daniel, you should then consider getting a "conversion" kit for this printer whereby you can have external ink containers hooked up to the printer - which you can refill whenever required - and therefore save lots of $$$/euros/whatever. The kits are available from USA. Search the web for the source. My late friend 'converted' his Epson this way (some 5 years ago, the age of your printer), and he bought the inks at dirt cheap prices at our local Computer Fair. BC -- "Will the highways of the internet become more few?" George W Bush -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

* Doug [02-12-10 19:04]:

Some years ago, I bought an Epson printer. It worked fine until the ink ran out. I then bought some "generic" ink refills and installed them. Very quickly, they clogged up the non-removable heads and made the printer a boatanchor. I don't recommend substitute inks!

I have an Epson Stylus Photo 925 I purchased 8 Feb 03 and have been using generic inks for 3-4 years now. us$8 for a black cartridge, I believe the color is us$13 and have to clean the heads less often than with the original *expensive* Epson inks. And photos are beautiful and the generic inks seem to hold their color much longer than the two years and fade to green/blue the Epson inks provide. But it is still much cheaper and longer lasting to get the prints made a WallyWorld or Walgreens or CVS or Meijers .... and use the printer for text and ... -- Patrick Shanahan Plainfield, Indiana, USA HOG # US1244711 http://wahoo.no-ip.org Photo Album: http://wahoo.no-ip.org/gallery2 Registered Linux User #207535 @ http://counter.li.org -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org