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How to install a printer to Vista when the maker doesn't supply drivers
This thread and installing this printer has been a real learning experience for me, and its value goes far beyond this one model printer and this one OS, Vista, (and maybe even beyond printers?). How to not be stymied by the manufacturers lack of accomodations for printers and a specific OS. Thanks again for all the help I got. comp.periphs.printers added More below. On Fri, 08 Jan 2016 18:09:49 -0600, in alt.windows7.general Paul in Houston TX wrote: Micky wrote: I'm runing Vista, which is a lot like Win7. A friend gave me a laser color printer, a Brother MFC-6800 fwiw. The Brother site has drivers for XP, but no drivers for Vista. I've finally bumped into the big complaint I heard so much about, a shortage of drivers for Vista. Did you check here for a work-around? http://www.vistax64.com/vista-hardwa...00-driver.html The first time I replied to you, I'd read the thread too quickly, and I said it hadn't worked for people, but when I had fewer other posts to read, I read again, and one poster had a solution, and 3 other people said it worked for them!! Two with the same printer I've got and one with another model. The guy, Videoguymike, gave detailed instructions. The upshot of his instructions were, instead of using the big package, with software and drivers, which I had tried a little while earlier, to instead use only the driver package, which Brother is good enough to list separately Going back a step, when I tried the large setup package, that Brother urges you to use, none of the Setup.exe files would work, even in compatibility mode. They got farther in compat mode than without it, but not very far. (BTW, what happens when you set Setup.exe to use compat mode, but it calls or installs a bunch of .ex_ programs. Will everything be in compatibilty mode during the install? Maybe so, but what about later, during printing?? It seems unlikely. OTOH, there are a bunch of ex_ files in what I did next (but because of a temporary hardware problem, I may not yet have tried to execute them.) So, instead of the big driver and software package, the "Full Driver & Software Package" he used the "Add Printer Wizard Driver; This download only includes the printer drivers and is for users who are familiar with installation using the Add Printer Wizard in Windows®." And I've certainly used the windows printer install "wizard" many times. Here are his instructions. I should add that when you download the "Add Printer Wizard Driver", the next page displayed gives a shortened version of his instructions. I don't know whether to praise Brother for all this or to criticize them for not putting this file under the Vista (and maybe the 7, 8, and 10) install instructions. I'm pretty sure using these instructions will work better, be more tailored to this particular printer, in 7, 8, and 10 than relying on what they have built in. Also, I'm not sure where "Printer Driver & Scanner Driver for Local Connection" fits in. That's the third choice for downloading. I dl'd it just now and I'll look at its contents: It's smaller and has only 1/4 of the number of files. I thought it would be bigger. Brother also didnt' provide the kind of instructions they did for the "Add Printer Wizard Driver" http://www.vistax64.com/vista-hardwa...00-driver.html This is what I did. 1:Shut off or disconnect the printer. 2:As above mentioned delete your Brother printer and remove all current drivers. REMEMBER to Reboot before continuing. Windows hates when you don't REBOOT a million times. I didn't do these two steps, maybe not needed because I'd not succeeded in installing anything earlier. (The printer wasn't connected, as Dominique said it should not be.) 3ownload from Brother ....... He corrected this later, to make clear he meant Add Printer Wizard Driver Version A 5.73MB 07/01/2005 See details from .inf file at the bottom**** 4:Save the download in a new folder and run to decompress it inside this folder. 5:Go to add printers and Add a local printer Brother says this too, but when you don't have instructions, you might be discouraged because "Add a local printer" says "Use this option only if you don't have a USB printer. (Windows automatically installs usb printers when you plug them in.)" Despite this, this is the choice to use. He leaves out, Choose "Create a new Port"**. and then iirc choose "Local Port". **But of the two choices, only that one allows his step 6 below: 6: I am using a USB connection so I chose the USB001 (Virtual printer port for USB) I would have never come up with USB001. But when I googled it, I found "USB001 is the default printer port for USB printers and is the first port Windows selects when connecting a printer via the operating system's Devices and Printers ..." Who knew? 7: Choose Have disk I hate to spoil the end of hte story, but what's REALLY interesting here is that if you DON'T choose Have Disk, and you go through tthe list of pre-provided printer drivers, starting with Brother, one of the choices is DCP-1000. A few lines later in Videoguymike's instructions, he points out that DCP1000's drivers are what is being used for the MFC6800. So if I'd known that earlier, I probably could have just chosen DCP1000 from the list!!!! I can't find who in this thread suggested if they only specified groups of similar printers, that would help. 8:Browse to the folder you saved the files in and open the US-ENG folder These instructions are from 2008. Apparently they used both US and UK english drivers. Wow. But now there is only one set. 9:You want to choose the file called "br64add.inf" then click Open This wasn't there either. It may say Open but in this case it really means Select for opening in the next step. 10:Ignore the windows This Driver is not digitally signed. Windows always seems to ignore us. I don't think I got this message. 11:Hit Next 12: Type a printer name showed me a "Brother DCP-1000" As far as I can tell the printer driver is a generic for a number of models. I just changed the name to Brother MFC-6800 See what I mean. Now that it's installed, it still shows DCP-1000 some places. 13: Hit Next, Next and then cancel the Test page. 14:Reconnect your printer and power up Now here I had fun figuring this out. Windows is going to find new hardware and install the Brother Printer. Let it do its thing. My back was turned for whatever he's talking about. There was a bubble above the systray. Then in Control Panel / Printers just delete this new printer and set the one you installed manually. Send a test page and mine began working like it was supposed to. I dont' think I have anything to delete. Plus there is no FAX entry for this new all-in-one, but until I get the hardware problems solved, that doesnt' matter. I can print any of the built-in Reports, like the Help List and User Settings, and the pages look pretty good. The first one had two spots the size of the inside of an e, but the second page had only one smaller spot. Plus a little horizontal streaking, that can probably be cleaned up. But after a bunch of messages to open up the cover, etc. I'm still getting "machine error af" which seems to be about the scanner PCB not being plugged in. Of course I want the scanner, but it's not needed to print, so that's annoying. But I'll read what google has and work on it. Oh, it's not a color device after all. I finally noticed that there was only one toner cartridge and no reference to color. I was so happy to get a laser all-in-one that I built its quality up one notch, to color. And the woman I got it from didnt use it for business. I must have thought that after I found a business form on the glass for copying. And I called her a friend but she was really a stranger on Freecycle, and I found her posting this morning in my old email and it say *she* got it free from another recycler and didn't know if it worked or needed toner, but she hadn't used it and wanted to get rid of it and another one (which was too heavy.) She never said it was color either. I can't tell yet if the 16' USB cable is too long or not. Still, this has all been a wonderful experience for me, and I hope it's been worthwhile for you all. ****He lists details: ; Brother MFC Setup File ; Copyright (c) 2005 Brother Industries,LTD. ; FileName : br64add.inf I don't have this file ; Function : Printer ; I/F : LPT/USB ; OS ; Windows XP for x64 ; Model : DCP-1000 ; MFC-9160 ; MFC-6800 ; MFC-6800J ; MFC-9180 ; MFC-4800 ; MFC-9030 ; MFC-9070 ; MFC-4800J ; FAX-2850 ; FAX-2900 ; FAX-3800 He got this list from the .inf file that I don't have. But the .inf file I have shows 20 models, even more than the 12 above, some added in the last 7 years (and some omitted). How about that!!!! "Brother MFC4800 "Brother MFC6800 "Brother MFC8500 "Brother MFC9700 "Brother MFC9800 "Brother DCP1000 "Brother DCP1400 "Brother FAX2900 "Brother FAX3800 "Brother FAX4100 "Brother FAX4750e "Brother FAX5750e "Brother MFC9070 "Brother MFC9030 "Brother MFC9180 "Brother MFC9160 "Brother MFC9660 "Brother MFC9880 "Brother MFC9760 "Brother FAX2850 |
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How to install a printer to Vista when the maker doesn't supply drivers
On Sun, 10 Jan 2016 11:06:41 -0500, Micky
wrote: I hate to spoil the end of hte story, but what's REALLY interesting here is that if you DON'T choose Have Disk, and you go through tthe list of pre-provided printer drivers, starting with Brother, one of the choices is DCP-1000. A few lines later in Videoguymike's instructions, he points out that DCP1000's drivers are what is being used for the MFC6800. So if I'd known that earlier, I probably could have just chosen DCP1000 from the list!!!! I can't find who in this thread suggested if they only specified groups of similar printers, that would help. Vanguard suggested that. Downloading drivers almost at random and lookng for a list in their ..inf files might work, especially for Brother, but seems like extra work. |
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How to install a printer to Vista when the maker doesn't supply drivers
On Sun, 10 Jan 2016 11:06:41 -0500, Micky
wrote: I dont' think I have anything to delete. Plus there is no FAX entry for this new all-in-one, but until I get the hardware problems solved, that doesnt' matter. I don't remember seeing two entries before, but now there is Brother MFC-6800 and Brother MFC-6800 USB. When things are working, I'll figure out which is better. I can print any of the built-in Reports, like the Help List and User Settings, and the pages look pretty good. The first one had two spots the size of the inside of an e, but the second page had only one smaller spot. Plus a little horizontal streaking, that can probably be cleaned up. But after a bunch of messages to open up the cover, etc. I'm still getting "machine error af" which seems to be about the scanner PCB not Brother says, It's broken, send it in. Anonymous says, It's the scanner, you can't fix it. Another page says It's the scanner, reconnect it. Plus some instructions So I tried to find the scanner pcb and instead I found some cracker crumbs I'd never noticed before, even though I'd had the paper feeder open many times. They must have come from a hidden cache. I brushed them away and the error message has disappeared!! Then the paper feeder wouldn't feed, and I found a quarter square inch of what seems like newsprint in the feeder. Now the feeder feeds but I still haven't gotten Print from Computer to do anything (cable too long?). I tried copy and the copy is all black. Back to the manual! "Wipe the electrical terminals referred to on page 20-18." I'll do it but I don't think that could be it, because the internal reports printed fine. It must be in the scanner, esp. since I used to get the scanner error. I should get a shorter cable and try printing from the computer again. Still, this has all been a wonderful experience for me, and I hope it's been worthwhile for you all. |
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