Samsung Printer Drivers

Excuse me, but this is unbelievable. This is the second case in a week where we have seen support from a manufacturer for Linux platforms but not Mac OS X. I hope you take the time and effort to contact Samsung and ask for similar support for Mac OS X.

To get your printer working right now, you can try the samsung-gdi-foomatic drivers from linuxprinting.org. You will also need to install the ESP Ghostscript package. There is no PPD for the ML-2250, but my guess is that one of the other models should work. This printer is listed as a Samsung GDI printer by the linuxprinting.org.

Hope this helps.

Matt

Mac Mini; B&W G3/300

The PPD files you downloaded from the Samsung site and the PPDs contained in the download from the linuxprinting.org site are not interchangeable. A PPD contains a lot of information and is tailored to the driver you are using.

The PPD that came with the Samsung Linux software will not work on Mac OS X. The PPD file that came with the Samsung Linux download tells the CUPS to use the Samsung software that was installed.

The PPD files that come with the linuxprinting.org's samsung-foomatic package tells CUPS to use the gdi device built into ESP Ghostscript.

I don't guarantee that downloads from the linuxprinting.org site will work with your printer. The samsung-foomatic package is all we have that might work.

Matt

Mac Mini G4; B&W G3/300

I also have the Samsung ML-2250 AND ML-1610. I'm just wondering if the procedures posted here work or not, pkulak, have you tried yet?

Correction, in this case, my Samsung printers are connected to Windows XP, not to Linux boxes like in pkulak's case.

Yup, I tried it, and no worky.

Sorry it didn't work. Let's have another try. I changed one of the Samsung PPDs a bit to use a different device that is built into Ghostscript. I put a trial PPD on my site which you can download. My suggestion is that you first delete the Samsung printer queue you already installed and then add a new queue. That way you can leave the PPD on your Desktop and navigate to it by choosing "Other" for the PPD. As you had tried the Linux PPD before, I'm sure you know the other ways to get the PPD attached to a printer.

I changed several things in the PPD. First I changed the model number so that it would match your printer. The other change I made was in the command it sent to Ghostscript. The previous PPD you tried called for Ghostscript to use the "gdi" device. I changed that so that Ghostscript uses the "samsunggdi" device. That is the device that was cited on the linuxprinting.org page for this printer.

Let us know if it works at all. We can do some other customizing to the PPD to more closely match your printer characteristics if need be.

If you are trying to
print from OSX to a printer hooked up to a Windows
box, you should still need the right drivers on you
OSX machine... right?

Ideally yes. There is a way to circumvent that on a Windows box. See the oft cited <http://iharder.sourceforge.net/macosx/winmacprinter/> on how to create a redirected printer in Windows.

Matt



Mac Mini G4; B&W G3/300

Hmm... that didn't work either. Although, I have been
trying all of this over a network. I think the
appropriate thing to do is to first try plugging the
printing directly into my Mac and try to get it
working that way,

That would be a help in determining where the problem might lie.

just so I know for sure if that PPD
you spent all that time modifying works or not.

It actually took less than 2 minutes to change the model number and the device name to pass on to Ghostscript. It may well be that the 'gdi' and the 'samsunggdi' devices built into Ghostscript are actually the same.

There was also mention that the 'hpijs' package using the 2150 driver might work. This courtesy of Greg Sahli in this message.


Matt

Do you have any information on exactly how you modified the PPD? I have a simular problem, and I was wondering if there was anyplace that told you how to do that...

Thanks.

Do you have any information on exactly how you
modified the PPD? I have a simular problem, and I
was wondering if there was anyplace that told you how
to do that...

Could you please be more specific as to what changes you want to make and what PPD you want to modify. I'm not sure pointing you to the 240 pages of Adobe specifications would be of any help to you. I haven't even read through the entirity of those specifications. Dealing with real world examples would be far less time consuming and get you what you want.

Matt

I'm having this EXACT same problem! I have a Samsung ML-2150, and I can't get it to work on my mac at all! Please let me know if you guys find a solution....
BTW, I have no idea what PPD or CUPS stands for, so if someone could enlighten me.....

Nathan,

You can get your Samsung ML-2150 printer to work by using what is called the "hpijs" driver set. You can download the hpijs driver and ESP Ghostscript from <http://linuxprinting.org/macosx/hpijs/>. You will need to download and install both packages. After you install these packages, you will find your printer in the printer list when you use Printer Setup Utility to add your printer. Be sure to get the downloads that end with ".dmg". These are specifically for Mac OS X. You do not want to download the source code.

CUPS stands for Common Unix Printing System. It is the printing system that is used in Mac OS X. Printer Setup Utility and the print windows that appear when you go to print are Apple's graphical user interface (GUI) to CUPS.

PPD stands for PostScript Printer Description. Every printer in Mac OS X must have a PPD. Although you may not have a PostScript printer, these files do describe the capabilities of your printer to the printing system. For non-PostScript printers, there is added information in the PPD file that tells CUPS where to direct the data stream for proper implementation for your particular printer.

Matt

Mac Mini G4; B&W G3/300

Matt,

Thank you! I'm going to give this a try tonight. I have renewed hope!!