Hi Everyone.

I am retiring my A1-XE. I just bought myself an AmigaOne 500 from Acube. I use my A1 for doing union business (I am a union steward) and I have to have a working printer at all times to do my work.

On my A1-XE I am using an old HP Deskjet 420 on the parallel port. It works perfectly, however on the AmigaOne 500, there is no parallel port so I cannot use this printer.

I need to find out which HP printer models work with OS 4 on the USB or over the Network. I need the printer to print documents, and I type all of them using FinalWriter. I am willing to buy an older model HP printer off of Ebay if that is what I have to do, I just need something that definately works on the A1-500 and Os 4.1.

Thanks for any help offered.

Yogi

@Yogi27

Best bet would be to purchase a copy of TurboPrint and use some old USB printer like the CXi970. I use such a beast here (SAM 440ep) with TP and it works perfectly. TP even supports its duplex print capability.

Not a new problem.

My all broachures where made in FW,DP,etc and printing is only for Classics and buy every time a new cartige once a year if drying up..

A new Classic is being set up hopelly in the next few weeks but if there is no Zorro usb or possibility to send the file to a pc then I'm quite off the works to rdit some leaflets.

The AOS4 did not help anything. Also there is a HP laserjet but where would I stick that when the XE is broken.. In my äss?

Maybe sending a FinalWriter work to somewhere and print.? Where that could be?

Many Years of waiting gets a little feeling of a hopeless situation.

@Yogi27

In the past I've used an HP parallel printer (HPLJ6L) with a simple USB to parallel converter cable/connector. I can't remember whether I connected it to my A1-XE or my print server.

Perhaps someone else can confirm whether this works?

TrevorD

Last edited by TrevorDick on 16-Jun-2012 at 03:23 AM.

_________________
AmigaONE X1000 "The real McCoy"

(Posted from Timberwolf Beta on the AmigONE X1000)

@Yogi27

Your problem is easily solved by a Postscript-compatible network laser printer for less than $200 US. I have two Sam440 computers running AOS4.1u4 and print via FinalWriter and other programs via Postscript to my Brother HL-5370DW black-and-white laser printer with an ethernet connection. I connect to the printer over my network from my OS4 machines and also my Mac OS X machines. I see the printer is available on Amazon for $192.53, although I think I bought mine locally from either Staples or Office Deport some time back.

This printer even has wireless networking support, although I've only used the ethernet connection.

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@mbrantley

Good morning/evening/night Mr.mbrantley!

If I get My OS 4 in a few years to work (as is it still in a shop, the XE) and If it is a possibility to load up the FinalWriter work from the dd disks and print to a hp 2600n can I get it in colour too without any hassle?

Or should I just get a mac? I know, a guy just asked had You allready got an apple as he has five pc's and one mac when painting the roof.

I said no. Just got five Amigas and one pc for games and net.

Dreaming still mode on.

@PR

My Amiga solution is monochrome Postscript-compatible laser printer only. I just don't know what's possible in terms of printing color these days from AmigaOS. I assume the solutions are limited to non-existent though maybe TurboPrint and an older inkjet could work. I'll defer to others.

I do my own color printing from Mac OS X.

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@mbrantley

Colour postscript printers work just fine as well.
I also understand that printing via usb, or network works as well.

For general printing guide see this

_________________
Peter Swallow.
A1XEG3-800 [IBM 750FX PowerPC], running OS4.1 upd6, using ac97 onboard sound.

"There are 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't."

@Yogi27

I am using a HP Photosmart (model B110 or something similar) which I bought for £39.99 and use a free HP_Photosmart driver (from Aminet or OS4Depot can't remember) and also have Turboprint installed that uses a HP_PhotoSmart75xx driver, this printer is wireless so can be accessed from any computer on the network using on the Amiga netprinter.device, I have to say it works flawlessly!

The printer also has a scanner that can be accessed via MUI OWB for scanning to the Amiga, best printer/scanning solution I have ever had with an Amiga

The printer may not be available any more direct from retailers but is available on eBay new!

Last edited by sicky on 16-Jun-2012 at 10:24 AM.
Last edited by sicky on 16-Jun-2012 at 10:22 AM.

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SAM 460 with 2GB or RAM, 1000GB HD, 4 port SATA, DVDRW drive and Radeon HD 4650 GFX card.

@Yogi27

http://www.nextag.com/Trendnet-1-Port-Parallel-60404235/prices-html

Buy a printer server, it works, used on a pc in old days.

You can setup printing using lpr, I think you find that on Aminet.

http://aminet.net/package/comm/tcp/lpr-dev

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 16-Jun-2012 at 11:24 AM.

_________________
Software developer and forum troll.
Please check out my software:
Excalibur, Basilisk 2, AmigaInputAnywhere.

All (!) color printers I tested do work as long as it is an HP supported by HP driver on Aminet or a color Postscript Printer. BUT keep in mind, color printing photos always (at least for the various models I tested) turns out pretty dark...
If you find an old printer model working with TurboPrint, you can also get good color quality for photos. Buying a "network printer" or printserver puts you Hardwarewise on the "save site"

_________________
Geomarketing at
www.geobiz.de
www.gebietsplanung.net
www.geomarketing-consultant.de

@Yogi27

Any HP model that supports being plugged in nornally over USB should be fine. I say that because a friend bought a top of the range HP printer and when he tried to use it with OS4 his A1 didn not pickup the printer. No sign at all. For a machine with a built in USB hub and card readers this was not normal. I can't recall the model now, but somethiing was wrong with his setup. He put it on his Mac then bought another off eBay for his sister and found it worked on his A1!

Sorry that was confusing story.

But, I compiled that Photosmart driver, that still haunts me today, and tested it with a budget HP all in one. It worked fine. C4180 at the time. Still use it.

Here's what you do. For the printer you are interested in, any one. look up the specs on HPs site and locate the Language. If you see PCL3 GUI you should be fine. The Photosmart driver speaks PCL3 but I have found it works on PCL3 GUI. It's just limited to 600DPI.

There is no need for TurboPrint or buying an expensive laser because it does PostScript.

And, with TurboPrint, you need to pay for it. As well as know how to install it or nor to install it as last time I checked it wasn't a native OS4 application and the installer can hack an OS4 system.

@Hypex

Well, the "native" PhotoSmart driver has a problem, you may know It prints far too dark.

As for TP, ZedoNet (IIRC) provides an OS4 compatible installation archive. A customer should ask for it. A friend of mine bought TP7.60 last year and after some trouble with the installation, he asked for the archive. He got it and all went fine.

The main advantage of TP is, that it supports full PCL3GUI, so the printer could be used with its highest resolution and additional stuff like duplex printing (as the CXi 970 does). Disadvantage is that it supports not the newest models. But this is true for all Amiga drivers, sadly

The PostScript solution has its advantages, too. I use an old HP LaserJet 4M/Plus for b/w prints, and it works like a charm (these beasts are merely undestructible). Its a network printer, so theres no trouble with USB, USB/parallel adapters and such (theres still a problem with those DOT4 compliant USB/parallel adapters and sometimes you dont know if an adapter is indeed a DOT 4 one or not).

@whose

Yes I've been told it's dark. But it shouldn't be any darker than the other HP drivers as it uses the same code. I also examined the code and can't see where it goes wrong. However with the HP's they have shingling and depletion. What densities have you tested?

It's good there an OS4 compatible installer now. How about they compile an OS4 version and generate interest? Be good if the OS4 team could have made a deal.

But, you do have to pay for it. So if you shell out money expect advantages.

But for a cheap priting solution the Photosmart solution works.

Last edited by Hypex on 18-Jun-2012 at 04:25 PM.

@Hypex

I tested it using all possible densities. Yeah, I took a look into it the time before and I couldnt find the cause, too Seems to be related to the black channel, though...

Well, as for the OS4 version of TP, I dont believe that they will ever release it. There were some actions taken already, but ZedoNet doesnt show intentions to do this. Maybe its caused by restrictive license agreements with the printer manufacturers (the manufacturers are well known for this for several years now...).

Yes, for some simple printouts the Photosmart driver is good enough

@whose
Quote:

I tested it using all possible densities. Yeah, I took a look into it the time before and I couldnt find the cause, too Seems to be related to the black channel, though...

I've used two methods for getting around the dark printing:
1. I load pictures into ImageFX and lighten the image. Offhand, I don't remember if I boosted the Gamma or the brightness but it worked fairly well.
2. I save the picture as a JPEG and copy the picture to the flash drive that is plugged into the HP all-in-one printer. Then I print the picture from the front-panel menu. It produces really good pictures but with little or no image size control.

_________________
SAM Flex 800MZ with 1GB memory & OS4.1u4

@Hypex
Quote:

But for a sheap priting solution the Photosmart solution works.

I don't have any sheap to prit but I have a comment about using the Photosmart driver with newer Photosmart models. My C4180 died about 6 months ago and I desperately needed to print some documents so I bought an HP Photosmart Premium (C410? all-in-one). It works about the same with the Photosmart driver with one exception; after printing it waits for more pages and displays "Printing..." on the printer screen. After several minutes the printer times out, shows an error message and enters some sort of error mode. If I cancel the printing on the front panel then any further printing is missalligned. After a lot of experimenting with PCL codes I discovered that it needs a "job" code to terminate a print job. The code that I found is actually listed as a PCL5 code but it works. I wrote a script to send the code to the printer after each print job and the problem is solved.

I seem to remember that the C4180 also waited with "Printing..." displayed in the LCD panel but didn't cause me the kind of problems that I get with my new printer. Does your C4180 also wait after you have printed something and if so, could you see if the UEL code terminates the print job on the C4180 too? I'm assuming that you have created a DOS device (USBPRT:) or modified the PAR: device to use usbprinter.device instead. Creating such a device let's you send commands to the printer like sending commands to the parallel.device (PAR:) on a classic Amiga.

Here is the minimal script I use to send the code after printing:
; Reset printer after a file is printed
echo "*E%-12345X" TO T:pout NOLINE
type T:pout TO USBPRT:
delete T:pout

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SAM Flex 800MZ with 1GB memory & OS4.1u4

Wow, what a response. I appreciates everyone's input on this.

So, I have a couple of questions. First, should I do what NutsAboutAmiga said and use the parallel adapter on my HP 420 and then use the network lpr device?

My second question is, I can get a HP C4180 off of ebay, I see there is some discussion about it printing to dark, but how does it handle text documents out of Final Writer? Should I go this way and get one these printers off of ebay?

Thanks for all the input so far,

Yogi

Thanks from me too. Hopefully getting the XE back some year and the tower next week.

Printing is fine from TurboPrint in the old one. The new one hopefully Hyperion surprises us and we all buy these xx -model printers, Ideal for a supporter?

Some sales? I Think every Amigaguy would buy that kind/model of a colourlaserprinter/copy machine that is supported.

@Xenic

It´s a PJL code, not PCL There are two or three PJL revisions, but AFAIK PJL2 is supported by all available devices supporting print job processing (my LaserJet4M/Plus does).

@Yogi27

For text printing (B/W) all is fine with the Photosmart driver. The "printing too dark" problem is related to colour printouts, mainly regarding blue colour (which is "messed" with black in some way. I didnt find out what happens there, maybe its time for some printer.device debug tool...)