[hpoj-devel] Re: HP OfficeJet G85 and PLC5

[Jens L. <jen...@go...>]

Till Kamppeter wrote:
> Jens Lehmann wrote:
> 
>>Till Kamppeter wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Jens Lehmann wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>Currently I use hpoj 0.91 on Debian 3.1 and have no printing problems
>>>>except the one described above. (I know that there is hplip, but as long
>>>>as the printserver does not work I still use the parallel port.)
>>>
>>>
>>>HPOJ is not supported any more by HP and by most distributions. Please
>>>upgrade to HPLIP from your distro or from http://hpinkjet.sf.net/  If
>>>your problem still persists after completely removing HPOJ and setting
>>>up HPLIP, please post here.
>>
>>
>>I upgraded to HPLIP. I was able to succesfully set up my printer if I
>>connect it by USB cable with my PC. Of course the problem I described
>>persists. If I understand correctly I somehow need to update the
>>firmware of the printer to make it PCL5 capable. Is this possible? And
>>if yes: how can it be done?
>>
> I do not know about a firmware update to PCL5 for any HP inkjet. Print
> servers do not need such a thing AFAIK. If you have a printer driver
> which makes the printer printing on USB, the same driver will make it
> printing through a print server.

That's what I thought, too. After all the print server should do nothing
more than directing everything it gets to the printer. However the US
Robotics support told me that the printer needs to support PCL5. All I
do is to print to http://192.168.1.1:1631/printers/hp via IPP. It would
probably require a firmware change in the router to make it working.

> To make the extra functions of HPLIP (scanning, ink level check, ...)
> working via an external print server, you will probably need an original
> HP JetDirect box.

Correct. All bidirectional features won't work (although I see no strict
reason why they could not work if the firmware of the router would allow
traffic in both directions). However that's not a big problem since I
rarely use these features and if I need them I can always locally
connect a PC to the printer.

Another question: Assuming I had a JetDirect print server, could I just
connect it to the router via Ethernet cable and then print from the PCs
on the local network?

Jens