Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale

[Bane]

 When a print job is queued with settings that need the black cartridge all lamps blink ("fatal error" indicator). This is on Ubuntu 9.10 amd64 and i386 NBR. Tried printing from Windows and works so it's not a hardware error.

hp-check.log is included in the attachment

Bane

[Bane (rudlavibizon)]

Also, I installed hplip 3.9.10, the problem is with both 3.9.8 and 3.9.10.

[Steve G. (sgo.ger)]

I can confirm that. Prints with "color" and "draft-color", but not with "grayscale" or "draft-greyscale". Tried also with Ubuntu 9.10 i386 and versions 3.9.8/3.9.10.

[mdo (mdowle)]

I'm getting exactly the same problem. I just bought the D2660 as my previous printer was classified as "paperweight" and I gave up trying to make it work. Now I'm getting problems with this brand new HP printer that I checked before buying was listed as "recommended" on http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/recommended.html and has "full" compatibility with linux.

I'm using Ubuntu 9.10. Happy to provide further information and debug traces if required.

Should we try re-installing/upgrading "HPLIP" on http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/index.html ?

[mdo (mdowle)]

There is a thread on https://answers.launchpad.net/hplip/+question/88814/+index about this. I'm not sure what I should do though. Does this mean roll back to 3.9.8 should work ?

Can someone confirm theres a problem with 3.9.10 ?

[Bane (rudlavibizon)]

I tried 3.9.10 and it still doesn't work.

On Thu, Dec 3, 2009 at 11:05 AM, mdo <email address hidden> wrote:

> There is a thread on
> https://answers.launchpad.net/hplip/+question/88814/+index about this.
> I'm not sure what I should do though. Does this mean roll back to 3.9.8
> should work ?
>
> Can someone confirm theres a problem with 3.9.10 ?
>
> --
> Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/487782
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>

[mdo (mdowle)]

What happens next then?

Should someone change the recommended list to remove this printer - or at least remove the "fully compatible" designation until this problem is resolved ?

Should I go back and try and exchange for a different printer ? or wait for a fix from Ubuntu ? Trouble is I can't trust the compatibility matrix anymore. How do I choose a printer that will work ?!!!

This bug doesn't seem to be assigned to anyone or have a priority.

Can we see a histogram of time taken to fix bugs like this in the past ? That would help me to know what to do next, which might include reverting to the OS of whose name we cannot speak.

[Bane (rudlavibizon)]

I really don't know, like you I chose the printer because it was supposed to
have full support. Right now I'm using my girlfriends machine with the
printer shared trough samba. I was thinking of installing a virtual machine
with WinXP or some kind of remote desktop with my gf's machine to make
things easier. I don't print that much anyway and I had
other priorities last couple of weeks. Maybe You or I should send an email
on HPLIP dev list if there is such a thing. I don't think threatening to
switch back to The Borg is going to make anybody look into this, but asking
politely might yield some results. It just looks like the problem is that
nobody seems to be aware of this bug for some reason.

On Thu, Dec 3, 2009 at 6:23 PM, mdo <email address hidden> wrote:

> What happens next then?
>
> Should someone change the recommended list to remove this printer - or
> at least remove the "fully compatible" designation until this problem is
> resolved ?
>
> Should I go back and try and exchange for a different printer ? or wait
> for a fix from Ubuntu ? Trouble is I can't trust the compatibility
> matrix anymore. How do I choose a printer that will work ?!!!
>
> This bug doesn't seem to be assigned to anyone or have a priority.
>
> Can we see a histogram of time taken to fix bugs like this in the past ?
> That would help me to know what to do next, which might include
> reverting to the OS of whose name we cannot speak.
>
> --
> Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/487782
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>

[mdo (mdowle)]

Good point. So for the record I'm sticking with Ubuntu :-)
I had a look at the bug list and theres quite a few New+Undecided, like this one, so I guess someone will get to it.
I didn't actually get emails or gedit docs to print at all (even simulated black using colour) but I'll give that another go. The only thing that worked so far for me was the colour test page. Like you I don't print that much either so its not a huge deal.

Btw, this bug seems to be the same as bug 490161. I put a reverse link (as a hyperlink in the comment like this) from that one to this one too in case that helps anyone.

[Isostar (johan-dure)]

Exact the same problem as the #1 poster

[Chris (nettin1)]

I have posted 2 bugs, NOW I have a fix
Go to the cups website,first unplug and delete all printers, go to the website and follow instructions it is interactive.
On the admin tab pick add a printer,plug printer in, it will ask user name and password,then it will install correct drivers and configure your settings based on what you want,fast draft,grayscale and if you want both color or only black cartriges installed.
Once finished close page check your printer and test worked great,you can also make changes on you pc or go back to the web page. I have struggled with this for 1 month nothing worked not hplip3.9.12 or any thing Now IT'S GOOD
CHRIS

[Bane (rudlavibizon)]

I can confirm it works with cups, just select hpcups driver from the list
when asked. I'm not sure this is configured on the cups website it's just a
web interface I think. Go to this address http://localhost:631, enter your
sudo password, then on Administration tab click add printer (it should
be plugged in) and follow instructions. It will show up as another printer
in the printing configuration, just set it as default. The cups driver
controls differ slightly but it's comprehensive. Thanks Chris.

On Sat, Dec 26, 2009 at 11:58 PM, Chris <email address hidden> wrote:

> I have posted 2 bugs, NOW I have a fix
> Go to the cups website,first unplug and delete all printers, go to the
> website and follow instructions it is interactive.
> On the admin tab pick add a printer,plug printer in, it will ask user name
> and password,then it will install correct drivers and configure your
> settings based on what you want,fast draft,grayscale and if you want both
> color or only black cartriges installed.
> Once finished close page check your printer and test worked great,you can
> also make changes on you pc or go back to the web page. I have struggled
> with this for 1 month nothing worked not hplip3.9.12 or any thing Now IT'S
> GOOD
> CHRIS
>
> --
> Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/487782
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>

[Isostar (johan-dure)]

This indeed seems to work. But now there is no option anymore to use both the color and the black cartridge. Thus, If you want to print a colored page, the black parts are also printed with the color cartridge :-(

[Bane (rudlavibizon)]

It works ok over here, did you select black+color cartridge in the advanced
tab?

On Sun, Dec 27, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Isostar <email address hidden> wrote:

> This indeed seems to work. But now there is no option anymore to use
> both the color and the black cartridge. Thus, If you want to print a
> colored page, the black parts are also printed with the color cartridge
> :-(
>
> --
> Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/487782
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>

[Isostar (johan-dure)]

I dont have an advanced tab in cups, hp-toolbox or my system settings printer page. The only options I have in cups are draft/normal color/grayscale and photo, but no combination of both.

- cups 1.4.1
- driver hpcups 3.9.12
(kubuntu 9.10)

Iso

On Sunday 27 December 2009 11:44:35 pm Bane wrote:
> It works ok over here, did you select black+color cartridge in the advanced
> tab?
>
> On Sun, Dec 27, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Isostar <email address hidden> wrote:
>
> > This indeed seems to work. But now there is no option anymore to use
> > both the color and the black cartridge. Thus, If you want to print a
> > colored page, the black parts are also printed with the color cartridge
> > :-(
> >
> > --
> > Deskjet D2660 doesn't print in grayscale
> > https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/487782
> > You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> > of the bug.
> >
>
>

[Carlos Cordoba (ccordoba12)]

Thanks a lot for the help in comment #11. It solved the problem for me too. Besides it seems that the cups driver gives more functionality and control over the printer than the hpijs driver

[cucujoidea (cucujoidea)]

The Cups workaround (comments 11 and 12) also solved the problem for me, thanks! (would be nice if it worked "out of the box").

[mdo (mdowle)]

It doesn't work for me. I just spent 60 minutes following instructions in comments 11 and 12, then repeating that, and it still doesn't work. I can't even print anything at all now. The printer test page doesn't work. I don't get any error messages on screen, the jobs seem to go to the queue then disappear without the printer printing.
I'm using Ubuntu Lucid 10.04.

[mdo (mdowle)]

Its the "just select hpcups driver from the list when asked" bit in comment 12 I'm having trouble with.
In the CUPS administration tab, under "add printer" there is a long list of models including :
     HP deskjet D2600 Series hpijs, 3.10.2 (en)
Which I assume is the pesky one we want to avoid. There are lots of other printers with CUPS included in the driver name but not as CUPS driver for the D2600 as far as I can see. Neither is there any generic "HPCUPS" driver as far as I can see, and I have scrolled up and down that long list a lot.
What am I doing wrong?

[mdo (mdowle)]

I've investigated a bit more and now have attached detailed log files. Can anyone see whats going wrong?
The test page seems to create an item on the printer queue but it then quickly disappears, the printer doesn't react at all.

I found this page : https://help.ubuntu.com/6.06/ubuntu/serverguide/C/cups.html
and ran the following. I was surprised that apparently CUPS wasn't already installed ?

home@Adam:/var/log/cups$ sudo apt-get install cupsys cupsys-client
[sudo] password for home:
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed
  cupsys cupsys-client
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 9 not upgraded.
Need to get 147kB of archives.
After this operation, 229kB of additional disk space will be used.
Get: 1 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid-updates/universe cupsys 1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2 [73.4kB]
Get: 2 http://gb.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid-updates/universe cupsys-client 1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2 [73.4kB]
Fetched 147kB in 0s (640kB/s)
Selecting previously deselected package cupsys.
(Reading database ... 207564 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking cupsys (from .../cupsys_1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2_all.deb) ...
Selecting previously deselected package cupsys-client.
Unpacking cupsys-client (from .../cupsys-client_1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2_all.deb) ...
Setting up cupsys (1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2) ...
Setting up cupsys-client (1.4.3-1ubuntu1.2) ...
home@Adam:/var/log/cups$

Then under Administration->Printing I did Help->TroubleShoot and went through the steps there. This gave me "sorry - there is no obvious problem" along with the attached log file it suggests to send into a bug report.

I have also attached the /var/log/cups/error_log corresponding to this test. Can anyone see what I'm doing wrong, please ?

[mdo (mdowle)]

Here is the /var/log/cups/error_log

[mdo (mdowle)]

I got it working! After clutching at straws I tried :

    $ sudo apt-get install hplip-cups

This installed hplip-cups. Only THEN do i see the CUPS driver (3.10.2) next to the hpijs driver (3.10.2). Comments 11 and 12 don't say you have to install the hplip-cups first. Comment 11 seems to suggest the CUPS web interface detects everything for you automatically, not for me.

Now my printer works with the cups driver (in colour mode). Going back to the hpijs results in the same no-output condition as before (print job disappears quickly with no activity on printer). Changing to the cups driver makes it work. No need to re-install or delete the printer to reproduce this.

Grayscale doesn't work - it looks like its printing but no ink comes out on the paper. I tried cleaning the heads but that button doesn't work for either the hpijs and the hpcups. Anyway, at least I can print in colour again !