Yet another scanner problem

Everything seems to be telling me the scanner should work... but it doesn't.

sane-find-scanner finds it, tells me what the vendor and product numbers are, and says it's located at libusb:002:003.

I've added this line to snapscan.conf (which is the file that handles my scanner):

firmware /dev/scanner-usb-:proc:bus:usb:002:003

When I try to run xsane I get the user agreement screen, and then I get an error message that says

Failed to open device 'snapscan:libusb:002:003'
Error during device I/O.

I'm pretty sure I've got the firmware line right... if I change it, I don't get the device I/O error (only the 'failed to open device'), so it seems like I'm a step further. What causes an I/O error? The scanner's plugged in and it has power.

According to this: http://linux.about.com/library/cmd/b...e-snapscan.htm the firmware entry should be to the file that contains the firmware rather than the scanner device.

If that doesn't help, what model of scanner do you have?

Chris...

W00t, a reply. ^^

I think that link might be a little out of date... my scanner is the Benq 5000U, which is listed in my snapscan.conf, even though it isn't on that about.com page. At least, the vendor and product codes that sane-find-scanner gives are in snapscan.conf under Acer/Benq/Vuego 5000. (Or does that just mean sane-find-scanner is just pulling up the codes for the closest thing to what I have?)

That link may well have been out of date; I didn't do an awful lot of checking without knowing what model I was looking for.

Did you try changing the firmware entry in the snapscan.conf file? If I deciphered the line from your file (unexpected smilies can be difficult) correctly, then you are trying to point the firmware entry to the file that represents the device. It should refer to the firmware file you downloaded because sane already knows where the scanner is located.

If that doesn't work, can you run

Code:

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$export SANE_DEBUG_SNAPSCAN=2
$xsane

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That should dump out extra debug messages. If you post them here we can try to debug them.

More information can be found here: http://snapscan.sourceforge.net/, which does indicate that your scanner is supported. I'm not sure where sane-find-scanner is getting it's answer from, but the sourceforge page says there are a few similar releases of the same scanner (5000, 5000e, 5000u).

Let us know how it goes.
Chris...

I think I'm unclear on what firmware actually is and whether I need it. Do you mean a driver directly from the manufacturer, because there isn't one for Linux.

Firmware is the control program that runs the scanner. This is seperate from the driver and is actually executed on the scanner itself. Normally firmware is burnt to a chip inside the scanner but BenQ have gone with a system that involves copying the firmware to the scanner when you power it up.

This has a few advantages, such as the case of the IPW2200 wireless network card gained the ability to to RF monitoring by upgrading the firmware. Firmware is also mostly OS independant because it runs entirely inside the device, and it is this program that your drivers interact with.

Fairly wooly definitions aside; Yes, you definitly need a firmware file. Go to the BenQ site (http://www.benq.co.uk/serviceandsupp...fm?product=565 UK site) and download the latest windows drivers. The firmware file is included in the zip.

Extract the files from the zip and look for 20FCV112.bin or similar. Copy it to a safe place, then change the firmware entry in the snapscan.conf file to match this safe location. You can delete the windows drivers after that.

Plug in your scanner and try it out. Sane should load the .bin file into the scanner transparently and it should spring into life.

Let us know how it goes.

Chris...

P.S.

Quote:

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I went to a planet where the dominant sentient species had no bilateral symmetry, and all I got was this lousy F-shirt.

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That cracks me up. :-D

Okay, that's what I didn't get-- the firmware file is included with the driver even if I can't use the driver. I wasn't sure if this was something in memory on the scanner, or what. I've used the scanner before, but not with Linux. I'll try it when I get home.

About the sig: I can't remember where it came from, but I'm seriously thinking of altering a T-shirt to be an F-shirt and painting that on it. Just so I can have one hanging in my closet or something. ;)

I found the .bin files and copied them all into a folder, and am pointing snapscan.conf at one of them. I've tried it with a few of them because I'm not actually sure which one corresponds to my scanner. The first few times it gave me the same old error message, and the last few it's just said 'no devices available'... and in between, the scanner sits there and hums like it's warming up. I wonder where the disconnect is.

Assuming you are working with the v6.2.5000u drivers, the firmware image is in bin/20FCV112.bin. What message did you get when you loaded that one?

Also, a question I should have asked earlier: Do you have the "scanner" module loaded? If so, pull it out and try again. You'll need to make sure hotplug doesn't reload it too, so check for it again after trying to make your scanner work.

Finally, what version of sane are you running? run "xsane -v" and post the results.

I thought we'd cracked it with the firmware setting.

Chris...

Okay-- let me look around and see if I've got the right package of drivers, because that particular file isn't in there.

The scanner module's not loaded... I read about that the other day and it turned out it was already unloaded. Still the same now, so it's not trying to load automatically.

My sane version is 0.95... so it looks like I'm a little behind. The snapscan page says BenQ 5000 works as of November, and the latest backends version is 1.0.17 something. I'll see if I can update it. (Do I have to uninstall the old version before installing the new one? They don't install overtop of each other, right?)

Thanks for all the hints-- I'm sort of relearning how to use a *nix system. :D I used to use Solaris, but it's been a couple of years.