Description

I spent about 6 hours trying to figure out how to make this box (PM1115U) work with linux, since no documentation was supplied with it and none could be found online. This article should hopefully save you time and lost hair.

By Stas Bekman.

Published: May 20 2007

startech.com Print Server Configuration with CUPS on linux

Someone suggested that it's cheaper buying a separate print server, than a printer that has built-in networking. Indeed this was the case. I bought startech.com's PM1115U USB Print Server for $30 from Dell. (They also have PM1115P unit with parallel port). Little did I know that it'll become a very pricey purchase, as I had to spend so much time trying to figure out how to configure it.

The bundled documentation didn't cover linux and nothing could be found online. PM1115U runs a little webserver, which is accessible by default via 192.168.2.2, I've reconfigured it to my subnet with a fixed IP of 192.168.0.5. You can do that by either connecting directly to the server box, if you have a cross-over cable. I didn't have one, so I cheated and temporary changed my router to use the 192.168.2.0 subnet, instead of 192.168.0.0. That worked. That was easy.

The next task was to figure out how to tell cups where the printer is located. PM1115U says to support IPP, but no matter what IPP URI I've tried - none of them worked. I tried:

    ipp://192.168.0.5/ipp
    ipp://192.168.0.5/lp1
    ipp://192.168.0.5/ipp/lp1
    http://192.168.0.5:631/ipp/lp1

and many other ways - none worked. Moreover, every time I tried a different URI the little print server crashed and I had to re-plug its power cord to reboot it. BTW, I've discovered that /lp1 in some windows-related document online. Eventually I gave up, but decided to try last thing, which wasn't IPP:

    lpd://192.168.0.5/lp1

and it worked. I connected HP LaserJet 2300d to it, so the final cups configuration in /etc/cups/printers.conf was:

    <Printer LaserJet2300>
        Info HP LaserJet with Duplexer
        Location Here
        DeviceURI lpd://192.168.0.5/lp1
        State Idle
        StateTime 1179629887
        Accepting Yes
        Shared Yes
        JobSheets none none
        QuotaPeriod 0
        PageLimit 0
        KLimit 0
        OpPolicy default
        ErrorPolicy stop-printer
    </Printer>

I hope you find this information helpful.

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Tags

hardware, startech, printer server, IPP, LPD/LPR, linux, cups, startech.com, PM1115U, PM1115P