[cups.general] Xerox Phaser 7400DN

[Helge Blischke]

John Jason Jordan wrote:

> On Wed, 30 Jan 2013 14:59:44 -0800
> Helge Blischke <h.blischke at acm.org> dijo:
> 
>>John Jason Jordan wrote:
>>>>> Please, does anyone have one of these printers with a CUPS driver
>>>>> that actually works? If so, I beg you to tell me which driver you
>>>>> are using!
>>> 
>>>>We used this printer a couple of years in a commercial environment
>>>>without any software related problems (only had some issues with
>>>>print quality and toner waste hancling). But note that we only used
>>>>the Xerox supplied PostScript PPD - no other pdl whatsoever.
> 
>>> So just now I downloaded the PPD from Xerox. I selected the Linux
>>> option and downloaded the tar file. After untarring it I found and
>>> installed the following PPD:
>>> 
>>> xrx7400dn.ppd	85.0 KB	Mon 02 Jan 2040
>>>
>>> After installing this PPD as a new driver I tried to print to it:
>>> 
>>> 1) The Properties options in the driver (in the printer management
>>> GUI) do not list Tray 2. I tried to add Tray 2 as an option, but it
>>> gave me an error that Tray 2 was not installed. Of course, all
>>> Phaser 7400DN printers come with a Tray 2, so why was that not in
>>> the PPD? I checked the box saying that the "optional" input bins
>>> were installed, and then I was able to select Tray 2 as the default
>>> paper source. However, printing from LibreOffice the only tray
>>> options are Tray 1 and "Paper." Regardless of which I select, the
>>> job as sent to the printer is set to pull from Tray 1. The only way
>>> I can get it to print is to walk over to the printer and manually
>>> tell it to "use available paper."
>>> 
>>> 2) While printing from LibreOffice I can enter the Properties for the
>>> printer, where I note in the Device tab that the Printer Language is
>>> set by default to PDF. If I leave it at that the fonts are garbled.
>>> In the drop-down there are options for Postscript Level 1, 2, 3 and
>>> "from driver." This printer has genuine Adobe Postscript Level 3, so
>>> I selected that. Now, if I close the options dialog box and reopen
>>> it I find that it is set to Level 2. It won't accept Level 3.
>>> Disregarding that problem, regardless of which Postscript option I
>>> choose I get fonts printing correctly, but the entire letter size
>>> page appears in the upper left corner of the paper 1.75 inches wide
>>> by 2.25 inches high. I looked all over for some "scale" option, but
>>> cannot find one, either in the LibreOffice print dialog options or
>>> in the Printer Management options.
>>> 
>>> 3) For my next exercise I opened the PDF file exported from
>>> LibreOffice in Evince. When I went to print it the print dialog box
>>> does show Tray 2, and selecting Tray 2 does work correctly. Yay! So
>>> now we know the tray problem is in LibreOffice. However, the fonts
>>> render garbled. I repeated with Okular and Adobe Reader, and got the
>>> same results.
> 
>>As this printer has been put out of service some time ago at our
>>company, I have no chance to do real tests now.
>>But I suspect the problems with PDF printing is due to the fact that
>>(nearly) all Linux distros recently switched to PDF as the
>>standard/default print job format. The printer itself does not offer
>>native PDF printing, so there is some cups filter used to convert PDF
>>to PostScript. Depending on the make of that filter there may be
>>problems with certain types of fonts.
>>
>>My suggestion is to revert your CUPS installation to PostScript as
>>default/standard print job format or use another pdf to ps filter.
> 
> Just minutes before receiving your e-mail I finally found a solution.
> 
> Yesterday I was desperately trying to print something for class and I
> was running out of time. Finally I fired up Windows 2000 that I have
> installed in Virtualbox. Previously I had set this printer up there. I
> opened the PDF that I had exported from LibreOffice into Adobe Reader
> on Windows 2000, sent it to the printer and it printed flawlessly. The
> same file printed with garbled text from Adobe Reader on Linux.
> 
> After thinking about this I tried a few more things, including creating
> a new Linux printer, but using the Windows PPD file instead of the one
> in the Linux downloads section on xerox.com.
> 
> When I print to this printer I get perfect output from Evince, Okular and
> Adobe Reader. But when I printed from LibreOffice I got garbled text.
> The print dialog  box in LibreOffice had been set to Postscript Level 2
> (because it wouldn't accept Level 3). So I changed it to PDF and tried
> again. Voilà! Perfect output!
> 
> Also, the printer trays now appear and work correctly.
> 
> So your observation that Linux CUPS defaults to PDF fits this scenario.
> However, before when I used the Linux PPD file the text was garbled
> regardless of what language setting I chose. So the other part of the
> solution was to discard the Linux PPD file, because evidently it is dreck.
> 
> Thanks for the help and suggestions.

Well, then I'd like to see the Linux PPD that lead to garbled output. 
Perhaps I then could file a bug to your Linux distibutor (pelase tell me who 
it is).

Helge