why ist so complex to install USB printer?

[Otto Sykora]

Could any of the experts here give me some understandable explanation
why it is so difficult to install USB connected printers ?

I have bought some time ago small PSC1200 from HP, had to install it
to my wifes w98se laptop. It took long tries , started few times all
over , but got it finaly running. Remamber installing some paralell
port printers in minutes to the same thing.

Recently bought Photosmart 2575 from HP. Tried to install it to my w2k
laptop, after 2 nights no results, printer not seen by the system or
when seen it does not print anything or the hwole system crashes etc.

The printer has lAN connection, so got a cable and treid this, in
minutes it was OK.

What is the problem in installing printers on USB?
What is an explanation to the fact the drivers should be installed
first and the the printer connected? This does not work many times,
after the connection of theprinter, windows will again discover some
hardware and searches for other drivers etc.

 

[zakezuke]

Remamber installing some paralell port printers in minutes to the same thing.

What is the problem in installing printers on USB?

USB is a more complex system than old style paralell. Paralell was, in
the most simple terms, a dumb interface, as in you throw data at it and
it relays data. USB in contrast is a smart interface where each device
has it's own ID and devices can share the same hub. You just can't
throw data at it and expect it to reach a device. Sharing things on
paraell involved dumb or smart switches, or driver support.

What is an explanation to the fact the drivers should be installed
first and the the printer connected?

This would seem to be software related and not related to USB
specificly. It's nice to install the drivers first so when you jack in
the printer, it sees the printer, sees the drivers are already
installed, and everything works. This tends to be important for all in
one devices as while the drivers permit using the device under windows,
it's the software suite that makes an AIO what it is, an intergrated
system.

But I must say I've had issues with HP drivers as of late, where the
only way I could install the driver was to add the printer manualy, lie
and say it was on lpt1 or the network somewhere, then jack in the
printer and switch to usb001 or whatever.

 

[measekite]

Could any of the experts here give me some understandable explanation
why it is so difficult to install USB connected printers ?

it is very simple for just about everybody

I have bought some time ago small PSC1200 from HP, had to install it
to my wifes w98se laptop. It took long tries , started few times all
over , but got it finaly running. Remamber installing some paralell
port printers in minutes to the same thing.

Recently bought Photosmart 2575 from HP. Tried to install it to my w2k
laptop, after 2 nights no results, printer not seen by the system or
when seen it does not print anything or the hwole system crashes etc.

The printer has lAN connection, so got a cable and treid this, in
minutes it was OK.

What is the problem in installing printers on USB?
What is an explanation to the fact the drivers should be installed
first and the the printer connected?

in all of the printer manuals that i read it clearly stated that. did
you real the entire manual?

 

[George E. Cawthon]

Could any of the experts here give me some understandable explanation
why it is so difficult to install USB connected printers ?

I have bought some time ago small PSC1200 from HP, had to install it
to my wifes w98se laptop. It took long tries , started few times all
over , but got it finaly running. Remamber installing some paralell
port printers in minutes to the same thing.

Recently bought Photosmart 2575 from HP. Tried to install it to my w2k
laptop, after 2 nights no results, printer not seen by the system or
when seen it does not print anything or the hwole system crashes etc.

The printer has lAN connection, so got a cable and treid this, in
minutes it was OK.

What is the problem in installing printers on USB?
What is an explanation to the fact the drivers should be installed
first and the the printer connected? This does not work many times,
after the connection of theprinter, windows will again discover some
hardware and searches for other drivers etc.

Is it really that much of a problem or do people
that have problems not follow directions. First
direction when installing any device is turn off
all other programs, especially antivirus programs.
Second, some windows versions just have problems.
Most of what I have read indicates that problem
installs were related to one of these or simply
hooking up the printer in the wrong sequence.

My current (since 2002) computer uses XP and it
hasn't had a hickup in installing any device on
USB. My HP 970 doesn't show ink levels but then
it didn't on my previous computer either, but the
USB on my current computer works much faster than
the parallel hookup on my previous computer.
My Canon 4000 installed with no problem.

 

[Otto Sykora]

it is very simple for just about everybody<

have asked some 'experts', well our network supporter and his deputee
to show me how to install the printer, they spent both 4hrs and
failed, saying: need some special testing software, changing some
entries in the registry, etc.

so I am am just an electronics technician, how can I deal with such
problem?

 

[Otto Sykora]

USB is a more complex system than old style paralell. Paralell was, in

the most simple terms, a dumb interface, as in you throw data at it
and
it relays data. USB in contrast is a smart interface where each
device
has it's own ID and devices can share the same hub. You just can't
throw data at it and expect it to reach a device. Sharing things on
paraell involved dumb or smart switches, or driver support.<


yes , this is clear, but I was operating 3 printers, one tape drive
and one scanner on one single chain of paralell cables on LPT1 without
problems for years. So I thought the technology advanced, the USB is
virtualy the only medium avaiable for printers, so it must be somehow
simple to use.

This tends to be important for all in

one devices as while the drivers permit using the device under
windows,
it's the software suite that makes an AIO what it is, an intergrated
system.<

well, under Linux, Knoppix-Debian based, no additional special
software needed, all components work together just fine. Why is it
such a pain under windows? Is tehre some technical explanation for
that?

Tried to add the printer manualy under win, but then windows tries to
install its own drivers for the compoenents found. I can see the
printer then present, is in the printer list, all drivers reported
operating, but when trying to print, some error reporting that
communication with the printer is not correct.

 

[Otto Sykora]

in all of the printer manuals that i read it clearly stated that. did
you real the entire manual?<

yes I did and therefore proceeded exactly as stated there and: failed

so did our IT people of our company, caiming this needs lot of manual
entries in registry etc and after abt 4hrs of trying they said having
no time for such fun.

 

[Otto Sykora]

Is it really that much of a problem or do people
that have problems not follow directions. First
direction when installing any device is turn off
all other programs, especially antivirus programs.<

turned all such thing as AV, firewall, non essential services etc off
sure



Second, some windows versions just have problems.
Most of what I have read indicates that problem
installs were related to one of these or simply
hooking up the printer in the wrong sequence.

My current (since 2002) computer uses XP and it
hasn't had a hickup in installing any device on
USB.

tried now in office on my XP-SP2, same problems, no way to install the
printer HP2575 under USB. LAN works fine.


Problem seems to be then in the supplied software? To install the
driver there, well it wants to install abt 390mb under w2k and
1.1gb(!) under XP.

To install ther drivers otherwise, have no idea how, since have not
found which inf file in which zip or compressed executable belongs to
which part of the printer.

Strange: unde Linux , all goes automaticly, no software needs to
installed, the printer prints, the scanner scanns, only 10 min and all
was fine.

 

[ato_zee]

well, under Linux, Knoppix-Debian based, no additional special
software needed, all components work together just fine. Why is it
such a pain under windows? Is there some technical explanation for
that?

I've a USB2 card and it's even worse, some devices are fine on the card,
others won't work, but are fine on the original USB, but give "This device
would work faster on USB2", except they don't. If it were the USB2 card
why do some devices work fine?

I think USB was designed by Microcraps redeployed Plug And Pray
team, that gives similar problems. Some of the devices some of the
time but not all of the devices all of the time. It's something
to do with fools and their money being easily parted.
I'm going back to SuSE.

 

[Brendan R. Wehrung]

I've a USB2 card and it's even worse, some devices are fine on the card,
others won't work, but are fine on the original USB, but give "This device
would work faster on USB2", except they don't. If it were the USB2 card
why do some devices work fine?

I think USB was designed by Microcraps redeployed Plug And Pray
team, that gives similar problems. Some of the devices some of the
time but not all of the devices all of the time. It's something
to do with fools and their money being easily parted.
I'm going back to SuSE.

Could I ask a stupid question? Did you try disconnecting all other USB
devices before connecting the printer? Some of my peripherals are finicky
about whaere they can be plugged in and I have to try various combinations
of powered hubs and direct connection (of which I only have 4) to find the
one that works. Generally, a directr connection (to the computer) works.

Brendan

 

[Otto Sykora]

Did you try disconnecting all other USB
devices before connecting the printer?<

sure I did that, from begining I connected the device directly to PC,
no other USB devices connected.


Otto Sykora
(e-mail address removed) (ROT13)

 

[Davy]

One problem is that people install their printers CD ROM, which yo
and I would expect to be normal..... so what happens is that Window
XP finds it's own pre-installed printer drivers from the i386 ca
files which adds to the fun, before the printer can work the USB mob
driver needs to be installed and the right port selected

Billy Squeeky Gates played a blinder here... how many times have yo
ended up with two printer icons....

Dav

 

[Otto Sykora]

This seem exact description of what I did observe. Have installed the
software from the CD supplied, this probably did not went through
correctly, have no idea , it is 1.1gb of software stuff.
On next occassion, windows did find all things again, installed its
own drivers from the named cabfile and the printer refuses to work
with it. All settings look fine, port enabled, printer in the printer
list, only when it comes to printing the testpage it sais no
communication with the printer.

 

[Splork]

This seem exact description of what I did observe. Have installed the
software from the CD supplied, this probably did not went through
correctly, have no idea , it is 1.1gb of software stuff.
On next occassion, windows did find all things again, installed its
own drivers from the named cabfile and the printer refuses to work
with it. All settings look fine, port enabled, printer in the printer
list, only when it comes to printing the testpage it sais no
communication with the printer.

I have installed a bunch of the usb flavor recently and they all seem to want
the printer driver installed before anything is connected. The instructions
would state so in the installation procedures.

If you connected the printer before the driver was installed from the cd you may
need to disconnect it, uninstall the driver, reboot, install the driver and then
connect the printer. Not sure if a reboot is required before connecting the
printer again.

After this, if it still does not print, go to the mfg website and look for
program conflict data.

FWIW, I never had an install go bad.

I hate USB.

 

[Otto Sykora]

negativ:

I did indeed install the drivers before I connected the device, even I
am not sure why this is so, but I followed the manual.

Despite of that, the win did install number of other drivers after
first reboot, so all the preinstallation did not help.

Also I am just curious how one is supposed to install the driver
before the device is connected. The drivers seem not to be avaiable in
some normal form as folders with inf files on the CD. The installation
can be done only by installing 1.1gb of software first apparently,
this software then at some time during the installation process seems
to try to install the drivers.
Tried also on one system to uninstall the software, this is not
possible, the uninstall script is clearing only abt the half of the
installed software. The rest has to be done manualy. It engineer of
our company spent abt 2-3hr to clear all.


So how can the drivers be installed in advance? Any idea?
Even if the software is installed, win will install its own drivers
which however will not work with the printer. Next step?

 

[Wilfried Hennings]

negativ:

I did indeed install the drivers before I connected the device, even I
am not sure why this is so, but I followed the manual.

Despite of that, the win did install number of other drivers after
first reboot, so all the preinstallation did not help.

Also I am just curious how one is supposed to install the driver
before the device is connected. The drivers seem not to be avaiable in
some normal form as folders with inf files on the CD. The installation
can be done only by installing 1.1gb of software first apparently,
this software then at some time during the installation process seems
to try to install the drivers.
Tried also on one system to uninstall the software, this is not
possible, the uninstall script is clearing only abt the half of the
installed software. The rest has to be done manualy. It engineer of
our company spent abt 2-3hr to clear all.

I know of several hardware units which need installation of drivers
before installing the hardware, e.g. a network card.
Reason is that otherwise Windows would incorrectly identify the hardware
as a different type and install its own but not fitting drivers.

The problem you mention sounds as if you've got a wrong installation CD.
I had one case where a CD was correctly labelled but contained something
different from what the label said.

Suggestion: Go to http://welcome.hp.com/country/de/de/welcome.html ,
download the driver (533 MB!) and try to install this.


--
email me: change "nospam" to "w.hennings"
Wilfried Hennings c./o.
Forschungszentrum (Research Center) Juelich GmbH, MUT
<http://www.fz-juelich.de/mut/mut_home>
All opinions mentioned are strictly my own, not my employer's.

 

[Otto Sykora]

The CD is correct, contains the same stuff as a file which can be
downloaded from HP instead. Latest version as they say.

Is there any trick how to install the drivers from the CD without
trying to install 1.1gb of garbage first?

And why the hell does windows recognise such devices as something and
in fact they are something else?

The problem is, that when I select in windows the CD as driver
installation source, it searches littele bit, deciding finaly to load
a driver from its own inf libraray.

 

[Dave]

you real the entire manual?<

yes I did and therefore proceeded exactly as stated there and: failed

so did our IT people of our company, caiming this needs lot of manual
entries in registry etc and after abt 4hrs of trying they said having
no time for such fun.

You'll find that most IT people are dumb as stumps and lied on their
resume's to get their jobs... If you install the printer by installing
the software, then shutting down the computer, plug the printer into
it, then power the printer up, followed by booting the PC, it will auto
detect the printer when it reboots.
I have installed probably hundreds of USB printers on various PC's and
laptops and have never had a problem with that method.

 

[Stanley Krute]

Unfortunately, HP consumer printers have a well-deserved reputation
for utterly crappy installation routines.

Has been so forever.

When a client tells me they've bought an HP unit, and wants me to come
help with the install, I warn them that there's 50/50 chance it'll fail,
as that's my experience.

As to why they install those hundreds of megabytes of crap software:
ya got me.

Sigh.

-- stan

 

[measekite]

The CD is correct, contains the same stuff as a file which can be
downloaded from HP instead. Latest version as they say.

Is there any trick how to install the drivers from the CD without
trying to install 1.1gb of garbage first?

do a custom installation. or use the control panel and install the
driver from there. when it asks you to supply a location for the driver
submit the location of the CD.