There are news about printing with MorphOS and TurboPrint 7.60.

Short version:

I have tried to use an Epson D88 Plus with the Epson C84 driver and it works fine.

Longer version:

Printing in MorphOS environment is not simple. TurboPrint (the printing system adopted by MorphOS 1.4.x under license by IreseeSoft [ZEDOnet]) contains outdated drivers, which mostly refer to printers that are no longer in production today. More recent drivers are containd in TurboPrint package version 7.60 (which was published in 2003), but even these drivers appear to be too old for today printers.

IreseeSoft [ZEDOnet] still develops TurboPrint versions for Apple and Linux environments, but the Amiga branch seems to be freezed...

It is not known if an upgraded version of TurboPrint (or even the original version contained in MorphOS 1.4.x) will be present in MorphOS 2.0...

So what hope remains to us, poor morphers, about printing?

Well, an unexpected solution comes from the fact that a few years ago printers finally reached the minimal resolution needed to print with the optimal look for human eyes. Without magnification none is able to see the single dots created by a printer at a resolution of, say, 720x1440 dpi. So today, new printers often don't have larger resolutions, but only feature price reductions, speed gains, lower noise, and increased quality of the inks. Thus it is likely that they do not need new software drivers, since the printing head movement and structure are the same as for previous models.

After summer vacations I found that the nozzles of my Epson C84 were all plugged, and in no way I was able to restore the printing head to normal working conditions. Today a new inkjet printer costs less than a technical maintenance operation, so I decided to try a new Epson as a substitute of my dead printer. I already knew that the Epson C84 driver of TurboPrint works fine with more recent models like Epson C86 and C88 (and probably D86). Well, I found and purchased an Epson D88 Plus and was lucky: it works fine at any resolution with the Epson C84 driver of TurboPrint 7.60.

Here at MorphZone there is a very old article written by me about the upgrade of MorphOS printing system by means of TurboPrint 7.60, but if you are curious and want to know much more, I strongly recommend you to read the updated and extended version (now it is a tutorial) published in March 2007 on my homepage (English version) and on the site of the Obligement web magazine (French version).

Good printing!

[ Edited by DoctorMorbius_FP on 2007/9/3 14:02 ]

nice, grazie

Allright this is good news!
Thank you very much for posting this experience.
Just bought me an old used epson st color 880 which workes ok but I am sure it won't hold too long.
Only downside off newer printers is that they stop when inkt is low and you can't see which inkt.
And the newer printers are expensive in replacing the cartridge's.

Thx man...great article about printing on MOS!

@ amiga4001

> Only downside off newer printers is that they stop
> when inkt is low and you can't see which inkt.

This is not true for Epson Stylus models C84, C86, C88, D86, D88, and D88 Plus.

Open the upper cover of your printer and look at the inner edge of the plastics chassis, close to the INK button. Find the arrow that protrudes there and points towards you.

Assume the LED inserted in the INK button blinks. This is only a warning: low ink in at least one of the cartridges.

1) Push for a while the INK button (be sure you do not push it for more than 3 seconds otherwise the nozzle cleaning routine starts).
2) The printing head moves and stops exactly in the position where the almost empty cartridge is pointed by the above-mentioned arrow. Be sure you take note of the color of the almost empty cartridge.
3) Push again the INK button and the printer head will go to the cartridge substitution position.
4) Push again the INK button and the printer head will go to the ready-to-print position.

After this procedure you can go and buy a new cartridge (now you know the right color). Do not substitute the cartridge! You can and should still print as long as the INK button LED blinks.

Now assume the LED inserted in the INK button lights permanently. This prevents printing because at least one of the cartridges is empty and the ink level is low in the relevant tiny tank of the printing head, too.

1) Push for a while the INK button (be sure you do not push it for more than 3 seconds otherwise the nozzle cleaning routine starts).
2) The printing head moves and stops exactly in the position where the completely empty cartridge is pointed by the above-mentioned arrow.
3) Push again the INK button and the printer head will go to the cartridge substitution position.
4) Remove the empty cartridge and insert the new cartridge.
5) Push again the INK button and the printer head will go to the ready-to-print position.

Go printing!

[When two or more cartridges are (almost or completely) empty, at every press of the INK button after step 2, the printing head moves to a position where an empty cartrige is pointed, until all empty cartridges have been pointed.]

Maybe this works even for older Epson Stylus models...

[ Edited by DoctorMorbius_FP on 2007/9/6 14:51 ]

Well thanks that is usefull information also.
Can't find the arrow on mine 880 but when this one gives up I'll look into one off the newer epsons.
Strange there are no updates off tprint any more.
I mean if it is this easy to use the old drivers to drive the newer printers it wouldn't be such an effort.
Only thing people woule need is a program to align heads and see inklevel.
I guess all epsons use the same interface for this?
And so do all HP,Lexmark etc..?
I am sure people would be willing to pay for new printerdrivers.

> Strange there are no updates off tprint any more.

The problem is that the Amiga/Amiga-like market is almost non-existent.

On one side there are very advanced projects like Hollywood, PageStream, CubicIDE. It is not a case that these are high quality projects managed by single programmers. There are few purchasers, but all the money (almost) goes into a single pocket, and the owner of that pocket can live. We should thank a lot these programmers, because they are still loyal Amiga supporters, and their software has a quality at the same level of the software available on the main platforms.

On the other side we have a couple of programmers that work for free, usually concentrate on single projects like conversions of programs and games from Linux, developing of well-established Amiga-only projects, or small very special projects.

In the middle almost nothing is still present: most software houses went away. Indeed it is very difficult for a company to survive with such small incomes like those that can be collected in the Amiga/Amiga-like market.

IrseeSoft/ZEDOnet, the makers of TurboPrint for the Amiga, followed this way. Their products now are mainly addressed to the Linux (TurboPrint) and MacOSX (PrintFab) markets. The development of TurboPrint for the Amiga seems to be currently frozen because it is no longer sufficiently profitable.

> I mean if it is this easy to use the old drivers
> to drive the newer printers it wouldn't be such an effort.

The fact that the Epson C84 driver is able to drive the Epson D88 printer does not mean that it is able to access all available print modes. For instance, TurboPrint for Linux has a specific driver for the Epson D88 family of printers.

> Only thing people woule need is a program to align heads
> and see ink level.
> I guess all epsons use the same interface for this?

I don't know...

> I am sure people would be willing to pay for new printer drivers.

Argh! This is a very delicate problem.

Guruman suggested a number of times that we might set a bounty for creating new printer drivers for TurboPrint: see here and here. Even an alternate hypothesis was advanced: the creation of a new version of TurboPrint for the Amiga that should be able to use the drivers of TurboPrint for Linux.

These are very interesting software projects that typically can be realized with the help of a bounty. I and other people agreed in the above-mentioned threads, and even if a number of legal problems were pointed out, it is likely that all of these can be solved, IMHO.

Anyway, everything stopped and was forgot until now, and will be forgot again in the next future, I presume. Why?

Well, this would be the subject of an entirely new thread, but, anyway, let me report here a few meditations.

The problem is that the bounty system of MorphZone (which worked well for a while, concentrating the interest of many people on several projects) is actually abandoned since more than one year. This seems a dramatic problem to me: bounties grow because the increase of funds collected usually attracts the interest of other donors, whose contributions increase the funds collected, and so on...

What happens if such a system is abandoned for more than one year, like on MorphZone? Old bounties stop collecting money, new bounties are strongly discouraged, potential donors are frustrated, the attention of people is distracted by other subjects, and the bounty system finally reach a stagnation state and then die. Unless the management activity restarts soon and continues constantly, MorphZone bounty system is terminating...

A volunteer like Acill tried to organize an independent bounty system, whose existence would be guaranteed by an always active administrator. But his efforts were frustated by the requirement of a unified bounty system made by some people. Well, IMHO, this requirement would be surely right if the current bounty system of MorphZone was alive, but since it appears to be almost dead, the requirement seems just insane to me.

IMHO, only the resurrection of Targhan or the direct intervention of BBRV can eventually solve this problem.

[ Edited by DoctorMorbius_FP on 2007/9/9 21:38 ]

Quote:

How about a bounty for that? :P


- CISC

@ CISC



In a small village all men can be partitioned in two classes:
1) those who are shaved by the barber and never shave themselves,
2) those who shave themselves and are never shaved by the barber.
The barber is a man who lives in the small village.

Who shaves the barber?

If you will be able to solve this paradox (by Bertrand Russell), maybe I will be able to solve yours...



[ Edited by DoctorMorbius_FP on 2007/9/10 0:47 ]

Quote:

The other barber obviously.


- CISC

@ CISC

> The other barber obviously.

Very smart attempt. But that is a small village, and there is only one barber...

(The paradox exists really in the realm of "intuitive set theory". In fact it was used to deny the internal coherence of such theory and adopt the "axiomatic set theory", where sets are defined in a much more specific way and such paradoxes are not allowed.)

However all these theories don't help me to set a bounty on MorphZone to restore MorphZone bounty system...

Argh!

Quote:

The barber from the other village then.


- CISC

Quote:

Well, that`s actually simple, because the only thing you have to do is rising the number of classes.

So you have:
Those who are shaved by the barber and never shave themselves,
Those who shave themselves and are never shaved by the barber,
Those who shaves themselves *and* are shaved by the barber (Which is obviously the barber himself)
Then there are those who never shave themselves and are never shaved by the barber because they either like to have their beards grown or their beard doesn`t grow at all.
And those who used to have been shaved by the barber until this fucktard cut them an ear or something and finally those who shaved themselves but then decided to get shaved by the barber because they are e.g to old to use a sharp knife to shave themselves.

Now that wasn't to hard wasn't it? (But if I understood your next comment right, that was actually about just divide such things in smaller, individuall pieces?)

However, Problem solved, now solve ours :D (Dammed, what a hairy story ;) )

Hey Oliver! It's been a long time since we met on the web! Hope everything is fine, now.

About the barber story: it was created in 1918 just to show that a paradox can arise. You can remove the paradox with more classes, or assuming that the barber has a low male hormon level and his beard does not grow. However the really important fact is that, IF (1) is true, (2) is true, no other classes are admitted, and there is only one barber, THEN the paradox arises. So set theory is faulty when the definition of a set is based on simple intuition. A non-faulty theory, where paradoxes do not arise, is possible if and only if the definition of a set is based on the requirements of specific axioms. In mathematics this is an old story: axiomatic set theory was established more than 80 years ago. (Anyway intuitive set theory is still teached to babies at school because it is very simple for them to learn.)

But this was only a word game played for fun by me and CISC. It is not the real question. The real problem for me is that this thread seems to show that very few persons care if the bounty system of MorphZone does or doesn't work. The real problem is that very few persons seem to care if they can or cannot print on MorphOS. These were items that would have created discussions, polemics, and revolutions a few years ago. This is the sign that stagnation effects transfered from software and hardware to user minds... The Amiga and Amiga-like worlds are dying since a long time. But now the transition of users from zombies to completely dead is occurring...

[ Edited by DoctorMorbius_FP on 2007/9/12 19:51 ]

Or maybe printing isn't as important as it was a few years ago..... writes the man who has printed exactly 1 page this year sofar.

@ Kronos

Well, printing is not important for you and is very important for me.

Maybe a fully working bounty system is not important for you, and maybe it is too much important for me.

These are extreme opinions: where is people in the middle?

(Anyway I'm creating a storm in a glass of water, just to see what happens. I don't want to be considered 100% serious...).

Quote:
I completely agree. I found it quite sad that just a few users
responded to the proposal of a bounty for updated printing on MorphOS.
Of course the main problem here is that the bounty system is not
working/updated anymore, and badly needs to be made operative again.
However I would have expected a bit more feedback: I was happy to have
a short exchange with CISC, and I think we were at a good point in
defining the terms of the eventual bounty, but almost no one
contributed to this simple brainstorming.

It might be that Kronos is right, however Joe User prints more than
once a year, and if we want to ever dream about new users (without the
OS is dead, I think it is safe to say so) printing has to be made
operational. Moreover, I don't print with MOS because my printer isn't
supported - tried also similar drivers - not because I never felt a
need to print.
So, I tend to agree with DoctorMorbius_FP more.

Kind regards,
Andrea

In my opinion, a good printing system is mandatory for an OS like MorphOS, and it seems to be a matter of priorities, as there seems to be enough time and manpower to integrate other things like 3D eye-candy.
I have to print quite often, but I can do all that with MorphOS, because I've gon a Postscript-supporting LaserJet. However, some kind of PDF-printerdriver would be VERY handy and a good base for a new printing system.
Regarding the MZ bounties... I would like to see the bounties back in action, because there were many useful projects originating from them.

As a Graphic Artist, I can not work with out a printing solution. If Canon, Epson, HP felt that printing was not that important than they would stop producing printers. I do not see this happening! MOS needs a good printing solution!

[ Edited by memering on 2007/9/13 14:39 ]

As the bountiesystem doesn't work anymore maybe we could contact the creators off Tprint and ask what a new edition off Tprint would cost to produce.
Maybe it can be done with the amigacommunity as this also uses Tprint.
Maybe there is a way for them to change the program to use the linux drivers?
For me I would gladly pay around 60 euro to get drivers for more uptodate printers.

This note is just to let you know that a dozen of drivers for HP deskjet and laserjet printers supported by TurboPrint 7.60 were not listed in my article on the subject.

This error has been corrected in the current revision 3 of the article.

I would like to thank my friend "AKiLL" who bought an HP laserjet printer and whose questions about TurboPrint 7.60 allowed me to discover the missing printers.

Hi all,

A question, does a Laser printer with usb work with TP 7.60?

Most modern Laser printers do not have a parallel port anymore but only usb, like the HP P 2015.

Regards

Christoph

Quote:
I did some tests using HP LaserJet 1100 printer driver included in TurboPrint 7.60 with HP LaserJet 1020 I bought for my wife PC's.
Even if Poseidon regularly recognizes HP LaserJet 1020 as USB printer connected to usbparallel.device unit 0 I got no way to make it work :(
I'll do more tests trying to set Poseidon in a way to make the printer work!
Hoping to give you more good news in the next days...
Bye,
AKiLL

@ rms

> A question, does a Laser printer with usb work
> with TP 7.60?

well, AKiLL and maybe other users can give an answer. I never tried to use a laser printer with my Amiga and Pegasos.

> Most modern Laser printers do not have a parallel port
> anymore but only usb, like the HP P 2015.

In principle there should be no problem (except for the speed of USB 1.x ports). All the (inkjet) printers I tried with my Pegasos were connected via USB port and worked fine. Poseidon is a software jewel.

if you have a recent HP LaserJet it would contain a PDF printer (simply send the pdf the same way that you would send a postscript file to the printer, they generally only support pdf upto 1.4)

as for supporting printers... there is always CuPS.
considering the amount of OS'es that it has been ported to (including the current maintainters Apple's MacOS X), it shouldn't be too hard to implement on mos either (probably a lot easier than implementing 3D-Layers). It would perhaps not necessarily be compatible with the old printing system... but then it shouldn't be too hard to make a CUPS printer.device driver for either MorphOS or TP after the fact so to speak.