usb printer problems

[Ben Paley]

Hello,

I'm having difficulty with usb devices, specifically a camera and a printer -  
I'm starting to tear my hair out!

Problem ONE is that they are not always detected. Sometimes everything goes 
fine:


========================================================
ugen0: Eastman Kodak Company KODAK EasyShare DX4530 Zoom Digital Camera, rev 
2.0
0/1.00, addr 3
========================================================


and


========================================================
umass0: EPSON USB2.0 MFP, rev 2.00/1.00, addr 2
ulpt0: EPSON USB2.0 MFP, rev 2.00/1.00, addr 2, iclass 8/6
ulpt0: using bi-directional mode
da0 at umass-sim0 bus 0 target 0 lun 0
da0: <EPSON Stylus Storage 1.00> Removable Direct Access SCSI-2 device
da0: 1.000MB/s transfers
da0: Attempt to query device size failed: NOT READY, Medium not present
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): READ CAPACITY. CDB: 25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): CAM Status: SCSI Status Error
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): SCSI Status: Check Condition
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): NOT READY asc:3a,0
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): Medium not present
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): Unretryable error
Opened disk da0 -> 6
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): READ CAPACITY. CDB: 25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): CAM Status: SCSI Status Error
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): SCSI Status: Check Condition
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): NOT READY asc:3a,0
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): Medium not present
(da0:umass-sim0:0:0:0): Unretryable error
Opened disk da0 -> 6
========================================================


(all the da0 stuff is to do with a built-in multi card-reader) and all the 
right device nodes are created for the printer - /dev/ulpt0 and /dev/unlpt0.

Sometimes these messages don't show up, but I get this a few minutes after I 
turn one of them on:


========================================================
uhub0: device problem, disabling port 2
========================================================


Or something like it, depending on where I've plugged it in.

I am really not sure what's making the difference, except that it seems never 
to work if either of them is on when the box boots up, or if I turn on the 
printer before the camera... but those are certainly not the full story, and 
I can't pretend to have been exhaustive in testing all the permutations.

Problem TWO is with the printer, a nice new Epson Stylus Photo R300, which 
works beautifully in Windows. In FreeBSD, the camera works fine (with gphoto2 
in the command line) once it's detected. But the printer responds very 
poorly. Doing


========================================================
su-2.05b# lptest 20 10 > /dev/ulpt0
========================================================


makes the printer kind of clear its throat, like it's getting ready to do 
something, but changes its mind. I've tried sending a line feed afterwards, 
and pressing all the buttons on the printer, and none of those things seems 
to help. The machine is supposed to accept US ASCII plain text, according to 
linuxprinting.org. At least I know I've got the right node, as redirecting 
to /dev/unlpt0 does nothing at all.

Although it seems futile to go further before I've sorted this out, I have 
tried some spooling stuff. Apsfilter, of course, and there's a proper driver 
for this printer, print/pips-spr300_310. I've installed that and followed all 
the setup instructions, configured /etc/printcap with the supplied script...


========================================================
su-2.05b# lptest 20 10 | lpr -Pspr300_310
su-2.05b# lpq -Pspr300_310

Rank   Owner      Job  Files                                 Total Size
1st    root       0    (standard input)                      210 bytes
========================================================


But nothing will happen at all, for ever, not even a throat-clearing. One 
thing I haven't tried is editing usbd.conf - is there any point doing that in 
this circumstance?


========================================================
su-2.05b# uname -a
FreeBSD potato.hogsedge.net 5.3-STABLE FreeBSD 5.3-STABLE #0: Thu Oct 28 
14:12:12 BST 2004     root at potato.hogsedge.net:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/POTATO  
i386
========================================================


Here's a bit of dmesg.today:


========================================================
uhci0: <VIA 83C572 USB controller> port 0xd000-0xd01f irq 10 at device 4.2 on 
pci0
uhci0: [GIANT-LOCKED]
usb0: <VIA 83C572 USB controller> on uhci0
usb0: USB revision 1.0
uhub0: VIA UHCI root hub, class 9/0, rev 1.00/1.00, addr 1
uhub0: 2 ports with 2 removable, self powered
uhci1: <VIA 83C572 USB controller> port 0xd400-0xd41f irq 10 at device 4.3 on 
pci0
uhci1: [GIANT-LOCKED]
usb1: <VIA 83C572 USB controller> on uhci1
usb1: USB revision 1.0
uhub1: VIA UHCI root hub, class 9/0, rev 1.00/1.00, addr 1
uhub1: 2 ports with 2 removable, self powered
========================================================


and here's a bit of my kernel conf:


========================================================
# USB support
device          uhci            # UHCI PCI->USB interface
device          ohci            # OHCI PCI->USB interface
device          usb             # USB Bus (required)
#device         udbp            # USB Double Bulk Pipe devices
device          ugen            # Generic
device          uhid            # "Human Interface Devices"
device          ukbd            # Keyboard
device          ulpt            # Printer
device          umass           # Disks/Mass storage - Requires scbus and da
device          ums             # Mouse
device          urio            # Diamond Rio 500 MP3 player
device          uscanner        # Scanners
========================================================


I'd really appreciate help with this stuff.

Thanks a lot,
Ben