Which Scanner

English Open Chat
#1

I’m looking for a flatbed scanner. Cheap to medium cost. Very light use. Does anybody have any recommendations of a flatbed scanner which works in 11.4? I’m considering an HP G3110. Will this work in 11.4? Any other suggestions?

#2

Should do; HP has made a lot of improvements in hplip to the scanner interface and it will now do things it could not do when I bought my HP scanner six years ago.

#3

Am I wrong in thinking hplip is only for printers?

#4

Am I wrong in thinking hplip is only for printers?

Yes. The hp-scan utility is part of the hplip package.

#5

Does this hp-scan utility support the HP G3110? HP says hplip doesn’t support any single function scanners.

#6

I found this Fedora thread which suggested that the hp3900 sane backend is the appropriate one for the HP Scanjet G3110 model.

Indeed, examining the output of

cat /etc/sane.d/hp3900.conf

shows this

# HP Scanjet G3110
usb 0x03f0 0x4305

so it should be detected ‘out-of-the-box’ by

sane-find-scanner

or

scanimage -L

You may need to make sure you’re part of the ‘lp’ group first (via YaST>>Security and Users>>User and Group Management).

#7

hplip requires xsane for the scanner functions; what has changed over the past five years is the integration and addition of a range of facilities into the interface.

If you first make sure that you have hplip installed, I have found that all that is needed is to plug in the device and YaST will then offer to install it.

#8

Thanks John. Can anyone confirm what John is saying before I plunk down my money?

How about a Canon or Epson scanner which seems to have more linux support?

Anyone using VueScan?

#9

HP actually have the best overall reputation re printers and scanners. I’d be careful about Canon scanners though.

This will give you an idea about which models are supported (without vendor drivers being required):

man sane
man sane-canon
man sane-epson
man sane-hp

#10

The man sane-hp command doesn’t mention the HP ScanJet G3100

#11

So if I configure the scanner as an HP 3900, it will work?

#12

You’ll find more info with

man sane-hp3900

This is mentioned there

NAME
       sane-hp3900 - SANE backend for RTS8822 chipset based scanners

DESCRIPTION
       The  sane-hp3900 library implements a SANE (Scanner Access Now Easy) backend
       that provides access at least to the following USB flatbed scanners:

              Model:                     Chipset:
              ------                     --------
              HP ScanJet 3800            RTS8822BL-03A
              HP ScanJet 3970            RTS8822L-01H
              HP ScanJet 4070 Photosmart RTS8822L-01H
              HP ScanJet 4370            RTS8822L-02A
              HP ScanJet G2710           RTS8822BL-03A
              HP ScanJet G3010           RTS8822L-02A
              HP ScanJet G3110           RTS8822L-02A
              UMAX Astra 4900/4950       RTS8822L-01H *
              BenQ 5550                  RTS8823L-01E *

You shouldn’t have to configure anything. Simply plugging this scanner in should be enough for it to be detected dynamically.

#13

Appearances can be deceptive. HP has always provided Linux support - and I would argue more comprehensive Linux support than anyone else - by releasing Linux drivers for their printers and scanners directly to the community rather than expecting you to download them from their website.

#14

Thanks John and Deano. I now have the confidence to splash out the money for the G3110.