Prev: <<<< Win 7 or Vista driver for Canon IP4000 >>>>
Next: Stylus photo EX to get alive again...
From: me on 10 Jan 2010 16:12
On Sun, 10 Jan 2010 08:26:33 GMT, "Snazz" <nospam(a)here.com> wrote:

>
>I'm really surprised you believe in fairies, but it takes all sorts.

I see logic isn't your forte.

>The point is that Canon don't themselves make this driver
>available from their own "Support" sources.

No, that is NOT what you said. So your memory is right up there with
your logic. You said, "But I still think it's totally unacceptable
that a printer manufacturer refuses to supply a driver for their
products." The manufacturer did supply it, that's how it got included
in the OS. Now you are trying to switch to complaining about it not
being on the web site. They did better, the basic driver is supplied
with the OS itself which others have said is not a new precedent. They
also provide the add-on and other sw for Win7 on their site.

>Getting a Canon
>driver from Microsoft is like getting spare parts for a Ford
>from General Motors . . . simply nonsense.

No, simply nonsense would be your analogy. Ford and GM are
competitors. Canon and M$ are not.
From: Arthur Entlich on 11 Jan 2010 18:44
Just to clarify something. Microsoft doesn't make any of the drivers
they offer in the updates or on line or in box (with the software). All
those drivers are supplied by the manufacturers, so Canon provided that
driver to Microsoft, and Microsoft tests it to try to eliminate
conflicts or other issues with their software. You are correct that
some printers and other peripherals do not have current drivers, and
there is some planned obsolescence involved, after all, they don't make
any profit on very old peripherals, so they don't want to produce new
drivers.

As anyone who reads my postings knows, I don't agree with that, and I
think if necessary the manufacturers should come up with at least a
basic working driver, and they could charge a nominal fee for the cost
of the update to cover their out of pocket expenses.

At least that way the peripherals would have an extended lifetime.

I also think the the Windows logo program which is supposed to identify
a product designed to work with a specific OS from Microsoft should
require the peripheral manufacturer to offer a certain number of years
of driver support to get the logo designation, even carrying it through
several OSs, but in my discussions with Microsoft about this they were
concerned that as it is, the industry looks at Microsoft as having too
much control over the market, and it could just lead to more DOJ
(Department of Justice)law suits, or equivalent in other places, etc.

Most of the printers I use are pretty ancient and still working (the HP
Laserjet family was unbreakable the first few generations), but they are
300 dpi and slow. I have kept a few Win 98SE machine around which I use
to maintain the printers. It just isn't right to destine these
beautifully designed and costly produced peripherals to the land fill
when they still work nearly as good as new.

A few final thoughts: you can huff and puff about the peripheral
manufacturers and threaten to go to another one when they do not support
their products with drivers, but the truth is it is really "a
conspiracy" they all do it. We need worldwide legislation to require
support for a certain minimal number of years, depending upon the type
of product involved and the environmental impact making, shipping or
tossing it involve. More and more countries are requiring some type of
"take back" system where the manufacturer must take the old hardware
back and properly recycle or refurbish it. If this become increasingly
costly, they might have to make more durable machines with longer "shelf
life" or get buried under their own garbage (literally and otherwise).

This also goes for over priced consumables like inks, toners and spare
parts, which can make it cheaper to discard a product than to refill it
with consumable goods. Some printers and photocopiers simply no longer
have their consumables available, or some small 25 cent part can out
them out of commission (which is why I suggest everyone read "Zen and
the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"). We all need to become a bit more
innovative with what becomes of our trash.

Lastly, keep Linux in mind. Much of the so-called obsolete hardware will
run on Linus, in some cases quite well. Linux being open source has
many people constantly writing code to allow it to run on and with older
machines, by striping away all the "junk" that makes the equipment slow
down.

You can find all sorts of open source peripheral drivers which will run
with Linux OS.

Art


If you are interested in issues surrounding e-waste,
I invite you to enter the discussion at my blog:

http://e-trashtalk.spaces.live.com/

Snazz wrote:
> Okay, got the driver from Windows Update, so problem solved.
>
> But I still think it's totally unacceptable that a printer manufacturer
> refuses to supply a driver for their products. I can only assume that
> Canon want me to junk a perfectly good printer and buy a new one,
> simply to get Win7 functionality.
>
> In the worst case, that's what I would have to do all right.
>
> But you can bet your last buck it wouldn't be a Canon !!
>
> Thanks to all for the help.
>
>
> Snazz
From: Arthur Entlich on 11 Jan 2010 19:27
Not really. Firstly, Canon and MS are hardly in competition with one
another, like Ford and GM are. They barely overlap on anything they do.
In fact they are partners. Using MS as the distribution network keeps
the cost down for Canon, and since they do not charge for the new
drivers, that's important.

Having all those drivers available from one source makes upgrading the
OS a lot easier when you are first installing it. It is, after all, due
to MS's OS change that required the driver replacement. It make sense
that MS can provide it with many others for other brands of printer or
other peripherals. Further, MS needs to do some basic testing on the
drivers and make sure they operate correctly and install properly during
the installation, so they need to control the distribution somewhat to
avoid a bunch of broken drivers or other issues cropping up.

Art



If you are interested in issues surrounding e-waste,
I invite you to enter the discussion at my blog:

http://e-trashtalk.spaces.live.com/

Snazz wrote:
> I'm really surprised you believe in fairies, but it takes all sorts.
>
> The point is that Canon don't themselves make this driver
> available from their own "Support" sources. Getting a Canon
> driver from Microsoft is like getting spare parts for a Ford
> from General Motors . . . simply nonsense.
>
>
> Snazz
From: Arthur Entlich on 11 Jan 2010 19:54
Occasionally, some 3rd party drivers have been written for scanners
which may provide access to functionality in "higher OSs".

An example is Bob Hamrick's Vue Scan which is a 3rd party product for
sale, which somehow got around a lot of the proprietary SCSI and other
interface issues.

I'm not sure what the current state of affairs is with that product today.

Art


If you are interested in issues surrounding e-waste,
I invite you to enter the discussion at my blog:

http://e-trashtalk.spaces.live.com/

TJ wrote:
> Jan Alter wrote:
>> "Snazz" <nospam(a)here.com> wrote in message
>> news:Zag2n.73070$BK3.58781(a)newsfe16.ams2...
>>> I'm really surprised you believe in fairies, but it takes all sorts.
>>>
>>> The point is that Canon don't themselves make this driver
>>> available from their own "Support" sources. Getting a Canon
>>> driver from Microsoft is like getting spare parts for a Ford
>>> from General Motors . . . simply nonsense.
>>>
>>>
>>> Snazz
>>
>> With print drivers being included in the OS and not available from the
>> printer manufacturer is hardly new. With the introduction of XP eight
>> years ago Epson printer drivers for printers before the XP release
>> were included and not available from the Epson website for the XP OS.
>> When Apple introduced OS X ten years ago it also included drivers for
>> HP, Canon, Xerox, Epson and others. Those drivers were removed from
>> the manufacturer websites and only available from the OS X
>> installation CD/DVD.
>> With some printer drivers for the older printers some
>> functionality was lost when Epson handed over the drivers for those
>> printers to Microsoft. I'd be interested to know exactly what is now
>> not working with your IP 4000 that you had before since you've
>> installed it on Windows 7. I'm assuming that since you've done the
>> Windows Update and the printer driver was installed you also went to
>> the Canon website and downloaded the Windows 7 printer module and
>> installed that as well.
>>
>
> It's not just printers, either. I recently installed an old Visioneer
> scanner on a Windows 2000 machine. Previously, the scanner had been used
> on a Windows 98SE computer. Both times the installation procedure was
> followed from the CD supplied with the scanner. The Win98SE driver was
> loaded from the CD. With W2K, however, the installation software
> directed me to the driver from the W2K files. There was no W2K driver on
> the CD itself.
>
> BTW, W2K is the highest Windows that can use this scanner. Visioneer
> didn't write drivers for XP, Vista, or W7. It's too bad. It's a nice
> scanner.
>
> TJ
From: TJ on 11 Jan 2010 23:11
Arthur Entlich wrote:
>
> I also think the the Windows logo program which is supposed to identify
> a product designed to work with a specific OS from Microsoft should
> require the peripheral manufacturer to offer a certain number of years
> of driver support to get the logo designation, even carrying it through
> several OSs, but in my discussions with Microsoft about this they were
> concerned that as it is, the industry looks at Microsoft as having too
> much control over the market, and it could just lead to more DOJ
> (Department of Justice)law suits, or equivalent in other places, etc.
>
<snip>
>
> Lastly, keep Linux in mind. Much of the so-called obsolete hardware will
> run on Linus, in some cases quite well. Linux being open source has
> many people constantly writing code to allow it to run on and with older
> machines, by striping away all the "junk" that makes the equipment slow
> down.
>
> You can find all sorts of open source peripheral drivers which will run
> with Linux OS.
>
There is a theory in the Linux community that in the past "exclusivity"
contracts with Microsoft prevented some manufacturers from supplying
drivers for Linux, lest they lose the ability to label their products as
"Windows-whatever ready." I personally have no evidence of this, but it
doesn't sound very far-fetched if you ask me.

Whatever the reason, some printer brands are not very well supported
when it comes to Linux. This is particularly true of the multi-function
machines. With some brands, the only way to get an open-source driver is
for somebody to do some reverse-engineering. While the printer part of a
multi-function device may work using the reverse-engineered driver for
another printer, the scanner is usually quite another story. There is
some evidence that that trend is changing, but for older products it is
still true.

If looking for a product to work with Linux, it's tough to beat HP. I
don't know of any HP printer that doesn't have a fully-functional driver
available in Linux, save for the very latest models - and it isn't long
after *they* come out before a Linux driver appears. While HP doesn't
write the Linux drivers itself, it fully supports the open-source
project that does.

BTW, the Visioneer scanner I mentioned in another post to this thread
does not work with Linux. It uses some kind of oddball chipset. There
once was a project to develop a Linux driver for this chipset, but it
fell through before anything could come of it. However, my HP
Officejet's scanner *is* fully functional in Linux.

TJ
First  |  Prev  |  Next  |  Last
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5
Prev: <<<< Win 7 or Vista driver for Canon IP4000 >>>>
Next: Stylus photo EX to get alive again...