[cups] Newbie seeks help / FreeBSD 12.0 / Brother MFC-7860DW

[Ronald F. Guilmette]

I *think* that I maybe just figured out where the slow is coming from
in my particular case.

It may perhaps not be improper conversion of PDF to a bitmap image.

Here's the deal... I have been -accustomed- to using my MFC-7860DW from
my old "main" system.  So I've become accustomed to nice fast printing
in that case.

But in that case, the printer has been using a direct USB 2.0 connection.

USB 2.0 == 480 Mbps, peak theoretical.

Now I have been trying to use this same printer over my local network.  And
as it turns out, my entire local network is all gigabit capable, and has
been for some time now, *except* for this bloody printer which, it turns
out, has only a paltry 10/100 Mbps ethernet interface on it.

And checking around now, I see that this isn't a question of old age.  Even
the modestly priced monochrome multifunction lasers that are being touted
as the current models on the Brother.Com web site RIGHT NOW also all have
only 10/100 network interfaces.  And it ain't just that one manufacturer.
It looks like they are pretty much all like that.  The cheapest monochrome
multifuction laser I found on sale new right now that has gigabit ethernet
is some Xerox model for about $199.

This is either widespread insanity on the part of all of these printer
manufacturers or else clever marketing.  I mean geeeeezzz!  In this day
and age, how much does a gigabit ethernet interface cost, in volume?  Maybe
like fifty cents or less?   So why the hell are all of these manufacturers
still selling this ridiculous 10/100 crap?    It makes no sense unless it
is their way of getting people to buy their higher end models.

So, I have choices.  I can (a) just learn to live with the slow, or else (b)
shell out $200 for a new multifunction monochrome laser, or else (c) just use
the little manual 2-port USB 2.0 switch that I own and that's been lying
around collecting dust anyway.  A pretty simple choice.

Anyway, I do believe that this is where the slow is coming from... the bloody
stupid 10/100 interface on the printer.

Consider this: Pages from an actual PDF document can probably convert pretty
well, and pretty compactly, to Postscript files, but converting HTML first
to PDF and then to Postscript doesn't seem to yield very compact results.

I did a Print-To-File of the google.com home page, using Firefox, and I ended
up with a PDF fle of 47 KB and change.  I used pdf2ps to convert that to a
Postscript file and the resulting .ps file was over 800 KB !  So it seems
to me that this may explain why it would seem to be less than instaneous
to get that whole thing just transfered over to my printer on a mere 10/100
ethernet interface.

Well, that's my theory anyway, and I'm stickin' to it.