Is Linux THIS Retarded?

[night_stalker_z]

Ive never had a problem printing in Linux or Windows so i cant really tell. You might need a better printer if it jams so often.

[gtho]

On my HP Deskjet 5740 - quite a cheap printer - I have a button to press to get the printer to resume after a jam, it is not done in software.

Same here with my Kyocera FS-820 laser printer. In fact, you can shut down the PC and leave it for a few days and once you hit the button it will still print whatever you were printing

[Fred Derf Veteran]

Depending on what you clicked before you resolved the paper jam problem, the printer may be marked as "Offline" in the OS. From the Windows Printer Control Panel you can right click on the printer and clear the "Offline" checkmark. That may resolve your issue without a reboot.

Usually pressing the "Go" or "Ok" button on the printer is sufficient to clear a paper jam but if you tried to attack the problem from within Windows first then you may have inadvertently marked the printer as offline.

[ntbnnt]

Yea, usally you have to do a sequence of stuffs to let the printer know that it is no longer jammed. After some time it might try again which is why Vista al of a sudden says, "Are u rdy yet?" But Linux would do the same thing, you have to let the printer know, its all in the printer.

[geoken]

I'm pretty sure Linux wouldn't be that retarded. As others have said, the individual subsytems of Linux are broken down to the point were the can be stopped and restarted without affecting the rest of the system. Killing and restarting CUPS should provide the exact same functionality as restarting the whole system as far as printing is concerned.

[jamend]

I'm gonna vote PEBKAC on this one.

[*John*]

Depending on what you clicked before you resolved the paper jam problem, the printer may be marked as "Offline" in the OS. From the Windows Printer Control Panel you can right click on the printer and clear the "Offline" checkmark. That may resolve your issue without a reboot.

Usually pressing the "Go" or "Ok" button on the printer is sufficient to clear a paper jam but if you tried to attack the problem from within Windows first then you may have inadvertently marked the printer as offline.

Tried that too :(

Vista just displayed "paper jam" regardless and refused to communicate with the printer, while the printer was sitting there with all printer lights and displays saying "ready".

If in Linux I can just restart CUPS in those circumstances, i'll certainly have to take a look at that (Y)

Cheers (Y)

[Fred Derf Veteran]

Tried that too :(

Vista just displayed "paper jam" regardless and refused to communicate with the printer, while the printer was sitting there with all printer lights and displays saying "ready".

If in Linux I can just restart CUPS in those circumstances, i'll certainly have to take a look at that (Y)

Cheers (Y)

Restarting the print spooler (from the Services control panel) is functionally equivalent to restarting CUPS.

[guruparan]

To what everyone said, tried it tried it tried it :D

You name it, it was tried, and Windows just constantly registered a paper jam regardless. Rebooting was me admitting defeat, as that was the only option left :(

What about Linux? Does it behave this way when handling printers?

Are you simply bashing Windows Vista?...we use vista in our office all the day..and if paper jams (sometime occured for me too), we just press the OK button or else we just press the green button (to continue printing) after we remove the jam...it does print correctly.

[kyro]

well.. i don't have much experience about printing in linux , whenever i have tried it (rarely) it just worked. and if it failed , i would say hardware manufacture's driver got retarded on linux , or some software got retarted on linux , I would never blame whole OS or whole ME as retarted for a print job.

[Mitch789]

Just wanted to say I have the exact same problem. Both my HP 1210 and HP F340 do this. I found this forum looking for an solution. All the things listed here I have tried also (and more.)

After spending hours searching the web for a solution I have found this on the HP support page looking for an updated driver (there is none):

"You might find that some of the advanced features are no longer available when using this basic driver. You can upgrade to an HP product that is fully compatible with Windows Vista if the advanced features are necessary"

I think the answer is that some printers just aren't FULLY compatible with Vista.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

Seems some people in this thread can't read.

Anyway, Linux printing sucks, I've always been able to print, but my printer shows up to Linux as a generic post-script printer with no options, I can't set a paper-size, colour/b&w, etc. OS X handles the transformation of paper sizes and such, but it shouldn't need to.

Now, it's getting better, but it's still fairly sucky.

[craybox]

if you are happy to restart CUPS in Linux then should equaly be happy to restart the spooler service in windows

net stop spooler

net start spooler

you might want to check any bidirectional options in the driver, I have had to remove all USB components from a users PC and reconnect everything to clear daft problems like this.

If all you ever do it print envelopes and basic stuff then it won't matter which OS you use, If you want to print high end graphics then you will have to check the manufacturers driver support especially in the READ.ME file where it tells you about known issues.

[NightmarE D]

So your printer gets jammed a lot and you're blaming Vista for that and thinking about going to Linux?

That makes perfect sense /sarcasm

Sounds more like your printer hates envelopes. I had an HP printer that worked fine with them, but this other Lexmark I had would always have issues with envelopes.