Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Help printing to a Dell A940

sbluetruck

sbluetruck

macrumors regular
Original poster
i know that there are no drivers out there for this printer. i've scowered the web in hopes of something that might work but i am soemwhat confused. i know that Dell printers are made by Lexmark, but would the Lexmark driver work for this Dell printer???

http://www.linuxprinting.org/show_printer.cgi?recnum=Dell-Photo_AIO_Printer_940

http://www.linuxprinting.org/show_printer.cgi?recnum=Lexmark-x5150

will this Lexmark driver work for this Dell printer?

i have tried using the Dell as a generic postscript printer with no luck. The Dell it's connected to shows the print dialogue and finishes, yet nothing prints. I know just about absolutely nothing about CUPS or GIMP drivers whatever so any help is appreciated!!!

Thanks!!!

oh, i'm printing over the WAN btw.
 
what does turning it into a postscript printer do? would it make some functions unusable?
 
sbluetruck said:
...

i have tried using the Dell as a generic postscript printer with no luck. The Dell it's connected to shows the print dialogue and finishes, yet nothing prints. I know just about absolutely nothing about CUPS or GIMP drivers whatever so any help is appreciated!!!

...
Click to expand...
Sometimes you have to accept the plain meaning of words. Your Dell is listed by the Linux Foundation as a paperweight. This means that it has no internal intelligence to emulate. If it has a printer control language, then the CUPS project could develop a driver which translates PostScript into the printer's native language. Your printer can only accept a rendered pixmap from a Windows computer and dump it to paper. If someone develops a Windows-based PostScript RIP (raster image processor) for your Dell, then you would be golden. You would then be able to use a Windows computer as a printer server for your printer. This is what gsahli was talking about. However, you could buy an inexpensive MacOS X-compatible printer for less than a PostScript RIP.
 
i also have a fairly new HP printer, but it has what i assume to be a bad scanner bulb and hasn't been working well. i know this would work but it's one of those things where, do you want to have two printers when you only need one?


so basically if i turned the Dell into a post script i'd lose my scanner functionality?

could i add it as another printers as a post script printer so i'd have "two" printers even though it'd be one?

hey, reminds me of hyperthreading.... i bet it won't work as well 🙄
 
You would have to set up and run a PC (Windows computer) as a print server, connect the Dell printer to the PC, and then make the PC appear to the Mac as a networked Postscript printer, through an assortment of opensource software.
 
The Dell will continue to work with the PC just the same. By following the procedure in the link (which CanadaRAM explained correctly), you can get printing capability from a Mac through the PC as server.
It's free - it's worth a try.
 
thanks for all the help guys!!! maybe things would improve with Leopard??? haha, it's a longshot.

i'll just try and get this "brand new" hp working... two years old and hardly any use.

oh well.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back