Dell 3000cn and Linux

Question

Hi, I'm trying to connect my Linux box to a 3000cn Is this possible in any way?? Mort

thenewandre · Answer

I would try printing via TCP/IP.(though the IP address)

mort_gib · Answer

Hmm yeah I get so far, that's the easy part, but there is no Linux driver for the 3000cn, only a PCL driver for Windows.
As Dell only brand these printers (they re supposed to be developed by thirdparty) there might be a driver from that vendor that would do the job.

songfire · Answer

I am having the same problem. I called tech support, and the woman said that the 3000cn is compatible with linux, but dell does not support it. She also told me that the drivers should be on the cd that came with the printer. She guided me through the disc to look for either an rpm or tar file, but both were not there. She then suggested that I ask on the support forums or search google for a copy, but I see there is only one thread here, and nothing on google. Does dell's right hand have any idea what the left is doing? Why would tech support believe in the existence of a linux driver if the entire www seems to be barren of any such thing?

This is all very confusing b/c I asked her specifically why the 3100cn is advertised as supporting linux whereas the 3000cn is advertised as only supporting windows. She checked with someone and assured me that the 3000cn does indeed work with linux, and that both the 3100cn and 3000cn are essentially the same printers.

Anyway, if anybody can help or clarify, I would appreciate it. dell's tech support struck out again.

Thanks in advance.

ynnek63 · Answer

I got my 3000cn to print under Xandros 3.0. I used the control center printer configuration tool and picked the generic driver. It worked although it only prints in grayscale and at 300 dpi, but it looked pretty good. I used TCP/IP.

jikamens · Answer

This printer works just fine with Linux. Here's how I got it to work
with Fedora Core, i.e., CUPS, Foomatic and system-config-printer; you
may have to do slightly different stuff if you're using a different
Linux distribution, but the general ideas remain the same.

On system-config-printer's "Queue type" tab of the properties dialog
for the printer, I've successfully used an USB queue, LPD network
queue and JetDirect network queue. I haven't tried a parallel queue
but I imagine that'll work just as well. Obviously, if you want to
use one of the network queues you need to make sure the machine is on
the network; you can configure its TCP/IP settings on the front panel
or let it get a DHCP address (I've done both successfully).

On the "Printer drver" tab, I selected the "PCL 6/PCL XL Printer"
under the "Generic" manufacturer and then selected the "pxlmono"
driver.

On the "Driver options" tab, I selected "Color" color mode.

Now, here's where it gets tricky.... Even with all of these settings,
the printer was still printing in monochrome even when I sent it color
print jobs. It took me a while to figure out that the Linux driver
doesn't know how to set the color print path correctly in the printer.
Perhaps eventually someone will figure out how to make the driver set
the print path correctly, but in the meantime, when you want to print
color, you need to set the color print path on the control panel under
Configure > PCL > Color Mode. I recommend you keep the color mode set
to black when you're not printing color -- the black-only color path
is much quicker.

Hope this helps.

jikamens · Answer

FYI, I've figured out how to get the printer to automatically feed B&W printouts through the black printer path and color printouts through the color printer path.  I've been circulating my 3000cn Linux instructions in several places, so rather than keep doing that I'm going to post them from now on in this forum thread:   http://forums.us.dell.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=S2500&message.id=1382   Please go there to read about how to make the printer path work automatically, and subscribe to that thread if you want to be notified automatically in the future when I post updates to my Linux notes for this printer.

Printers

Dell 3000cn and Linux

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