Good news about Turbo print working :-) I have never needed to use it myself because my printer is not supported :-(
I do rather agree with your rant. My own printer is an HPDesket 720C which without my knowing when I bought it, is a 'winprinter' in that it requires the PC to directly manage the print heads. There are 'free' drivers which work OK for text, but are pretty awful for graphics, and there is absolutely nothing I can do about it apart from buy a new printer. (I will do that when the ink runs out, as a printer does not cost much more than a couple of ink cartridges) To be fair to HP they have seen the error of their ways, and no longer make 'winprinters' and now sponsor an opensource project for Linux drivers for their current and future printers.Since so many people come to Linux with a printer already in their posession it is really a matter of chance how well it is going to work. For anyone looking for a new printer I would suggest http://www.linuxprinting.org/ as a first stop. The site is run by Til Klamppeter (spelling?) who is a Mandrake employee, so Mandrake have a better than average chance of getting printer drivers right. derek SNIP > Rant coming next : > > Personally, I think that is a bunch of B.S. > Someone ought to write a page ( easily found, say Mandrake.com ) > containing manufacturers that support, and do not support users. > You could go there before buying something and see what kind of effort was > / is made by said builder. Users could input their experiences as well. > Have an e-mail link right there for people to fire off at, say Canon, with > something like > " So I was in the store, mouth watering over your latest ( piece of > whatever ). I went home, Brought up > Crappyvendorswhosoldtheirsoulstomicrosoft .org, and saw that you don't give > a rat's @%% about my $$$$. > How unfortunate that you don't think supporting users is in your best > interest, Because Epson ( or whoever ) certainly does. Why they were more > than willing to have my business, and were grateful for it". > > I appreciate that people generously give their time, and effort to write > drivers for older products, and willingly share them. I do not think that > people should have to continue doing so. > I do not believe that Mandrake, or Red Hat, or any other distro should > have to write drivers, or basically beg vendors for some help. > So M.S. holds 90 % of the desktop, But 100 % of their victims are not going > to buy product X from Manufacturer Y. > ( I just had this conversation with HP two days ago, I don't know what > anyone here thinks of HP, I seriously doubt I will be sending any of my > money their way in the near future). > Maybe start an advocacy of sorts. And when the day comes that builders > write the Linux drivers along with the Windows drivers, ( because of > popularity ) remember those companies that didn't bother to before it was > popular to do so. I could continue, but I'm sure most have hit delete by > now.
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