AIX

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Can anyone tell me what brands ot network printers are supported on AIX 5.2? We have pSeries hosts running AIX 5.2. We have hundreds of network printers that are HP printers. We have never had a problem getting an HP printer to print. Recently a customer at remote location purchased a canon multi-function printer/scanner/fax machine. No matter what HP driver we select to use for this canon printer we can not get it to print. It appears to go through the motion but no reports ever print through.

Is there any way to make this printer work without adding an HP Jet Direct card to it?

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

That is not much to work on? What model of printer is this? What type of network card does it have? Is this a Windows only based printer? What printer language does it support? Does it even attach to the network? Does it have an lpd port supported?

There is not direct support for this printer from any release of AIX, but maybe I can help you if you can give me some more information.

John Tesch

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

You are right, I did not give enough information. The client actually has 2 different Canon network printers that we are having problems with. One is a Canon 3035 and the other is a Canon 5070. They are both attached to the network. I can ping both printers. When I try to telnet to them I get error message that a remote host has refused a connection attempt. And when I try to print from the network I get nothing. The client is able to print Windows type documents. They had a Canon tech there last week and he assured them the printer could be used as a network printer. However since it is not the "norm" for us I do not know the answers to your other questions. I do have access to the Canon tech though and I will ask him.

I will post a reply after talking to him.Thanks for your help.

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

I talked to the Canon tech. Here are the answers to your questions.
What model of printer is this? A 5070 and a 3035
What type of network card does it have? Canon multi pdl cards.
Is this a Windows only based printer? supports "apple talk" and IPX
What printer language does it support? postscript and pcl
Does it have an lpd port supported? He said NO but then later in the conversation he said they do support port 9100

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Just because it is a network printer doesn't mean it supports a standard Unix protocol. For example if the only printer service is to be a Windows network printer, then that won't help unless you print through the windows server, but if you have the right drives and support then it should work.

The brochures on these printers are a bit lacking,

The 5000 series has two different Network printing controllers.

1. Canon ImagePASS-Lx Print Controller (optional) supports Solaris so it is like we can get it to work.

Print Service: NDPS, Port 9100, IPP (Port 9100 is JetDirect default port).

PDL Support: Adobe PostScirpt 3, PCL 5e, PCL 6, PJL - so this should work with modifications to the HP drivers.

2, Network Multi-PDL Printer Kit-A2,
PCL is supported, but it doesn't say what protocl stack. It does say Solaris, so we would need to understand the solaris driver and how it works.

Realize that an AIX printer driver does not create output that is compatable with a printer, it only sends setup commands to the printer. We can change any of those commands.

But there are two requirements:

1. The printer must talk at some known protocol, TCP/IP port number something or LPD for it to work from AIX.
2. We must know the PCL commands needed to set it up.

Canon should be able to tell us the answers to these questions, not how to set it up from a Windows Server.

Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Ok, there are a couple things that we can do to test this printer.
First you can see if you can ping the address of the printer.
If you can't do that, you need to talk to Canon support.
- Appletalk and IPX are not going to help us at all.
- We need TCP/IP
If you can ping it, then see if you can telnet to port 9100
For a JetDirect card, this would then let you type in text and when done hit ctrl-T to end the connection (It will tell you this). It is not clear if Canon will have implemented this. If this works, we can for sure make this thing print. If it doesn't we still might be able to but we may need help from Canon.

Earlier you said that it makes some noise with the Jet Direct. That could indicate something is getting there. For example if we send Text and it is in PostScript mode it would do that.

Next test is to create a 'generic' queue to a Network Jetdirect printer.

smitty mkpq
Choose: hpJetDirect Network Printer (HP JetDirect)
Select: Other - for now we will send no setup commands to the printer
Select: Generic (Later you might try canon-lips4 in a separate test)
Do not make this a bootp/tftp server
ASCII: text (give a queue name)
PCL: pcl
PostScript: pstest
Printer connection
HOSTNAME - put the hostname of the printer you pinged.

This will create three queues.

lptest 10 10 | qprt -Ptext (will send 10 characters per line by 10 line)
- does this print?
lptest 10 10 | qprt -Ppcl
- does this print? Does it stair step
qprt -Ppstest /usr/lib/lpd/pio/burst/H.ps
- Does this put something on the page. Should be header page without
- the information filled in.

Based on the results we can move to the next step.

Originally posted by: J.Homes

if the only printer service is to be a Windows network printer, then that won't help unless you print through the windows server, but if you have the right drives and support then it should work.
you might need to update canon printer drivers for windows 10

Originally posted by: Genny Swiss

You can try with the Epson printers brand as they are good with their services and the features as well. 

Every device might occur with some issues or you might face difficulties while connecting them, but  I think Epson printer troubleshooting is the only remedy to resolve the issues it comes up with. 

I have already used many of the models from this brand and I am quite satisfied with them.