I *really* hate complaints about lack of hardware support
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| Jeff91 Mar 15, 2014 11:49 AM EDT |
It blows my mind that people complain about Linux issues with piece of hardware XYZ. Why is it Linux's job to support YOUR hardware? How about you buy hardware that supports Linux instead? This would be like me complaining to Microsoft that Windows is awful because it isn't functional on my Chromebook. You know what they would do? They'd laugh at me and tell me to buy hardware that supports Windows. I don't understand why we hold Linux to a different standard. ~Jeff |
| Ridcully Mar 15, 2014 5:04 PM EDT |
For those not "in the know", I personally find that one of the best Linux software products for printers is a proprietary driver package called "Turbolinux". The costs are very modest, it's easy to install and set up and it gives more or less constant feedback as to what is happening in the printer, ink levels, cleaning, etc. It also has very good ability to set paper sizes, type of paper, colour....in fact, if there is anything about a printer setting, Turbolinux has it as far as my requirements are concerned. Recently, I had to purchase a new printer, and it turned out to be very newly released. There was a Canon driver that could be downloaded from the website - it worked, in a very basic way. A week or so later, Turbolinux updated it's driver base to include the new printer and the results were dramatically better. I was ashamed of Canon that it should release such a low level of printer driver quality.......one would normally expect the reverse.......Oh - but of course - silly me - I'm not running either Windows or Apple systems where Canon has produced superb driver sets. |
| the_doctor Mar 15, 2014 5:08 PM EDT |
Jeff91 is correct:
Quoting:Why is it Linux's job to support YOUR hardware? It's the hardware manufacturer's job to provide their customers with the appropriate drivers. You would think that Will Wheaton would be smart enough to check their website for Linux drivers before making the purchase. Don't blame Linux for your lack of planning. |
| Ridcully Mar 15, 2014 5:45 PM EDT |
The difficulty there, the_doctor, is that from my experience above, Canon would be quite justified in saying: "We definitely DO support Linux !!" And they'd be right.......legally and practically as well......but in the most minimal and disgusting way. My post above was simply to say to everybody that, as far as printers are concerned, there is an excellent Linux alternative. I agree, you should NOT expect your own distribution to support every darn piece of peripheral hardware that is available.....but you still do have excellent alternatives. In at least some cases. |
| numbers Mar 16, 2014 9:38 PM EDT |
Ridcully, do you mean Turboprint for Linux? http://www.turboprint.info/ My search of Turbolinux was a distro catering towards Japanese people. |
| Ridcully Mar 16, 2014 10:14 PM EDT |
Here you go: http://www.irseesoft.de/default.htm |
| kikinovak Mar 17, 2014 3:29 AM EDT |
The Turboprint homepage looks like the first self-made web page of a 12-year-old. In 1998. http://www.irseesoft.de/default.htm |
| Ridcully Mar 17, 2014 4:12 AM EDT |
@kikinovak.............So ???? Are we arguing about presentation or quality of software ????? Have you ever used the package ? I have, for the past 6 years at least. I repeat, it's nothing short of Brilliant !! |
| BernardSwiss Mar 17, 2014 4:35 AM EDT |
That page seems aimed at Amiga users. They have a much more modern looking pages/web-site, here. http://www.turboprint.info/ |
| gary_newell Mar 17, 2014 4:42 AM EDT |
I agree with you Jeff. To be honest though finding hardware that doesn't work with Linux is becoming rare. |
| Ridcully Mar 17, 2014 5:42 AM EDT |
Thanks BernardSwiss.......very much indeed. I had looked for that page you have given, but my first searches didn't find it and as a result I gave the Amiga page......The site you have quoted is the one that I know myself from previous purchases of the product. |
| notbob Mar 17, 2014 12:20 PM EDT |
> much more modern looking pages/web-site..... Yet, equally clean and free of client side scripts. Very nicely done. I have no problem with the older webpage. In fact I prefer it to the cluttered script-laden pages of most sites, some of which have so much crap I refuse to use patronize them. I use noscript to protect my box and some pages have as many a 60 scripts competing for browser and X resources. Who needs 'em. |
| gus3 Mar 17, 2014 12:28 PM EDT |
If the hardware makers want people to buy, use, and be satisfied with their products, they can either: --make drivers themselves, or --release the specs so someone else can make drivers. Heck, even ham-fisted Broadcom has seen a crack of light on this (in keeping with the Raspberry Pi's stated mission, which helps). |
| Koriel Mar 17, 2014 1:45 PM EDT |
Im not sure what the problem with your Canon printer is, in that you need to buy proprietary drivers (unless it is an very very new model), I use the open source Gutenprint drivers supplied in Linux Mint for my multi-function Canon MX420 it is autodetected through the "Add Printer" mechanism so its not a problem to set up.
Dont use the one's supplied by Canon on their website as they are limited regarding print resolutions etc.
The open source one works great and gives me a lot options except for ink levels but since they are always visible on the Canon display this is pretty much a non issue for me. My last printer was an Epson and it gave me far more hassles and the scanner was never supported which is why I bought the Canon this time around and im very happy with the level of support it has on Linux. I only manually use the Fax so I cant testify whether that side of things has Linux software support within stuff like Libreoffice but if anyone looks into it let me know the results. OK the situation with the Scanner side of the unit is not so great as open source drivers don't work with it so good luck in getting simple-scan to work(it didnt as of last month). But Canon do supply the Scangear plugin for scanning from GIMP which works very well and has a whole heap of settings in advanced mode so thats the only Canon driver I get from their website. Its all worked reliably for my 1 year old MX420. |
| Ridcully Mar 17, 2014 5:21 PM EDT |
Koriel, it was indeed a very, very new release printer from Canon. The reason I like Turboprint so much is that it also gives full feedback on what the printer is doing, ink levels, etc. etc. and all in superb GUI format. Print resolutions are fully controlled and like I said above, every aspect of printing has its own tweaks in the displays and menus. You can download a trial copy ......I think it works for a limited period and may or may not put a Turbolinux line across the printout....but it gives you a very good idea of what it can do. I have used Linux built in Gutenprint drivers in the past, but discarded them once I found out just how good Turboprint was. |
| Steven_Rosenber Mar 17, 2014 5:58 PM EDT |
Quoting:It blows my mind that people complain about Linux issues with piece of hardware XYZ. Why is it Linux's job to support YOUR hardware? How about you buy hardware that supports Linux instead? In theory this is great. In practice it doesn't work. There's no easy way to find out what is supported and what isn't, especially when it comes to new hardware. Often something that isn't supported on day 1 gets better support on day 60, or maybe day 120. Or never. For every 100 people who say "buy from ZaReason or System 76," I wonder how many actually do that themselves. I'd say almost none. And if either of these vendors offered a sub-$500 laptop, I'd be more inclined to listen. Unless things have gotten better over the past five years, it's pretty darn hard to know what is treated well by the Linux kernel, what has good driver support, and what will never work. In practice, it's the kernel developers who make things work, but it should absolutely be the manufacturers of these various devices -- video chips/cards, networking interfaces, power management setups -- that ensure their hardware works with Linux. They should at least provide specs that allow this to happen, if not code. The only way the "check before you buy" theory works is if everybody writes about their hardware. I wish this were the case. This crowd-sourced "what works, what doesn't" method works the worst for the newest hardware, and it's rare to buy new "old" hardware. We buy new "new" hardware -- things that are just being released or are up to six months old. The manufacturers should help with this. Any big vendor -- Dell, HP, Lenovo, etc. -- would win a lot of geek points if they either ensured Linux compatibility or at least warned you if it wasn't going to happen. Would it kill them to test with Ubuntu? It seems like it will, and that's a pity. |
| Ridcully Mar 17, 2014 9:36 PM EDT |
Steven, at the risk of being declared "anathema" by everybody, I am going to commit heresy and say that I believe it is the very diversity of Linux that frightens off the big vendors. We love that diversity, true....But look at it from the point of view of the big company. Do they make the software so that it runs sweetly with Debian-based or RPM based distros for a starter.....and will it run in Gnome, Unity, KDE, Trinity, Xfce, LXDE........ummmmm......need I go on ? And if they do decide to support more than one structure, the cost is doubled, tripled, etc.......and remember "profit is all" in the commercial world. Given the size of the Linux market, I doubt the big boys can justify the cost. The beauty of Apple and Windows (as far as the big boys are concerned) is that there is just one system with one interface - yeah, I know that's simplifying it and of course there are different versions too....but nevertheless, there's a lot of truth in that concept. |
| DrGeoffrey Mar 17, 2014 9:49 PM EDT |
Quoting:The beauty of Apple and Windows (as far as the big boys are concerned) is that there is just one system with one interface Malware writers and NSA prefer just one system, too. |
| Ridcully Mar 17, 2014 11:13 PM EDT |
Absolutely, DrGeoffrey.....the diversity of Linux is one of its biggest assets for security purposes. But like I say, it does make it harder for the "big boys" to produce good driver packages for their hardware. |
| Jeff91 Mar 18, 2014 11:51 AM EDT |
Quoting:In theory this is great. In practice it doesn't work. There's no easy way to find out what is supported and what isn't, especially when it comes to new hardware. Often something that isn't supported on day 1 gets better support on day 60, or maybe day 120 This is a cop out. You can 100% find out what hardware works and what doesn't before you buy it. If a vendor doesn't advertise Linux support (or have hardware that is listed as supported elsewhere) then don't buy it. Up until the last year I purchased all of my hardware on a college student's budget and all of it either came with Linux by default or had no OS - and I made sure the hardware supported my OS of choice. You buying hardware and then complaining it doesn't work doesn't do anything to change that vendor's behavior. You speak with your wallet - and by buying that hardware that is incompatible with your OS of choice, you are telling that vendor it is OK to keep producing hardware that only supports Windows. ~Jeff |
| Jeff91 Mar 18, 2014 11:55 AM EDT |
Quoting:it does make it harder for the "big boys" to produce good driver packages for their hardware. How is this true at all? My hardware drivers do not care if I'm using apt-get, yum, or pacman. They don't care if I am using Enlightenment, XFCE, or KDE. They simply need to adhere to the standards the rest of the drivers that work with Linux adhere to. The Linux kernel has very defined standard for how to be included as a functional driver. The most complicated things are Video/Audio drivers as they need to integrate with X and then Alsa or what not, but again - there are standards for doing this. |
| Koriel Mar 18, 2014 4:27 PM EDT |
Unfortunately while arguing that you should ensure that your hardware is Linux compatible before purchasing is fine on paper and on the whole is perfectly achievable most of the time it is not foolproof. I purchased an AMD/ATI Radeon 5770 that was advertised as having Linux support and Tux was very clearly on the box. Im afraid this claim was at the time an extreme stretch as quite simply the catalyst drivers barely supported the card and their was so many issues visual and crashing with it that I simply pulled it from my Linux box as it was simply unuseable. One of the quite laughable flaws was if you minimized any window and then brought it back again, it would take anything from 3-5 seconds to bring the window back up, I simply could not believe they considered this as acceptable Linux support. When I inevitably made my way over to the Phoronix AMD/ATI forums to check out if it was just me or were their others having the same issues what I found was multiple threads of folks with major complaints so obviously with hindsight I should of popped into the forums before purchasing the card but cest la vie. I then just stuck it in a Windows machine where it is still to this day. I will never be purchasing an AMD card ever again as I literally spent weeks trying to get that thing to work on Linux with any degree of stability, the shame is the card works well enough on Windows but they have gone and lost themselves a customer by claiming something that wasn't. So even if hardware claims to be linux compatible the manufacturers could simply be lying through their teeth. |
| Jeff91 Mar 18, 2014 4:31 PM EDT |
Quoting:Unfortunately while arguing that you should ensure that your hardware is Linux compatible before purchasing is fine on paper and on the whole is perfectly achievable most of the time it is not foolproof. This is AGAIN the user being uninformed. When I say "do some research" I don't mean just look at the box and check for a penguin. Go out and read some reviews. I could tell you right off of the bat that ATI's Linux support is utter trash - regardless of what their packaging says. If you get a video cards that supports Linux (any intel that works with the FOSS drivers aka not GMA500 or Nvidia) you will have a good time. |
| Koriel Mar 18, 2014 4:39 PM EDT |
I agree Jeff, as I mentioned in my post that with hindsight I should of popped into the Phoronix forums before purchasing the card and I would of saved myself a lot of heartache but I made the mistake of trusting AMD claims so yes lesson learned for me. |
| helios Mar 18, 2014 5:42 PM EDT |
Let me interject my two cents here....adjusted for inflation and current market values of course..... Several years ago, I was contracted by AMD to set up a small in-house developers shop. The 9 computers were to run Redhat and instead of a centralized print and copy solution, they wanted all stations to have stand-alone copy/fax/scan/print capability. The lead in this DevTeam said that they would prefer Canon printers over the HP solution I suggested. I explained that the HP hardware I opted for had already been baptized by fire and was pretty much plug and play. I also recounted several stories of complete failure by Canon to even consider supporting Linux. He acquiesced which saved me a huge series of headaches. The only thing I had to do was add the HP control panel to the Gnome task bars and they were off to the races. I completed the contract 4 days early and $3100.00 under budget. Of course, under budget was the goal since the contractor received half the total amount saved as a bonus. So seeing a chance to gripe to Canon, I wrote them a pen and ink letter, explaining why they had lost four grand in sales because of their disinterest in supplying drivers for Linux. Realizing that $4000.00 didn't mean a thing to them, I didn't expect a reply. I actually did receive a response from which they toed the company line "our research has indicated that Linux users make up too small of a customer base to justify the time and cost of developing the print drivers for Linux ", I probably shouldn't have made that into a quote, but it's fairly close to their response. I have long since lost that paper document but I believe my buddy Devnet has it posted on his blog. If I get a chance to drop by there later, I'll see if I can't pull up and save that scan. As far as the turboprint driver software, I have used it and for the money, it is a great software release...polished and extremely user friendly. I only keep a handful of clients for my consulting business these days but the first thing I do if I find a troublesome Canon solution is to purchase the latest Turboprint software. It's well worth the 30-some dollars in comparison to the ensuing migraines trying to get Linux distros to work with Canon. But to their credit, they have made decent strides in writing drivers for many of their popular models. To even things out here, I spoke with an assistant to one of the Brother execs about their much improved support of Linux hardware and I mentioned that they could increase their sales if they would include the tux penguin on their packaging to indicate that the printer would work under Linux. He told me that the subject had been passed around the software development branches and that the decision not to add this was based on the high numbers of Linux distributions in use. They didn't want to indicate that Linux worked on Brother printers because while it might work in Ubuntu, it might not work in Fedora...I can't say that I blame them. It might have caused more headaches than not. Oops....that was way over two cents....awww, what the heck. Keep the change. |
| BernardSwiss Mar 18, 2014 7:38 PM EDT |
When it comes to printers, I just tell people "anything that's Postscript compatible, or that works with HP's PCL" (warning, there has been the odd HP printer that doesn't comply with those standards). Am I mistaken? Also, though I haven't used it, I wouldn't be surprised if TurboPrint provides a nicer, easier to use, more flexible solution in many cases. |
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