Legacy laser printer and scanner issues.

[Bombastinator]

Any old grey bearded business equipment wizards out there?

So I’ve got an old x97 build with Win8.1 on it, and some peripherals that are even older.  It’s my gaming machine.  Such as it is.  It’s getting a bit long in the tooth.  Once upon a time long ago it was reasonably hot.  I’m hoping to nurse it along till maybe mid 2020 before I do a full rig upgrade. (Windows 10. Blech.  I knew it has to happen though)

 

the laser printer is a brother 5040 (usb)

This actually did work well enough, but I had a hard crash, and when I brought it back up I could get documents to spool, and the OS recognized the existence of the printer (I think) but it wouldn’t actually print.

 

The scanner is harder I suspect.  It’s an HP scanjet 5300c.  Old old.  I can’t even get the machine to admit it exists.  Getting even one of these working in Win 8.1 would be super handy.

 

right now I’m looking at the minor horror of loading Linux onto an old Pi zero ive got and trying to turn that into a network hub.  CUPs and SANE.  So much evil it makes me nauseous.

 

It would be so much simpler if I could just get them to speak to my machine on USB.

 

Anyone feel like talking an old fool through nursing his geriatric children?

[badreg]

If the scanner still works, but just lack drivers for a modern OS, try VueScan.

[Bombastinator]

I’m hoping that’s the problem.  I’ll look at it, thanks

[Bombastinator]

Bah. Vuescan is $50.  The scanner isn’t worth $50.  

I really don’t want to build that print/scan server