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WARNING on the new Epson drivers

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
I just installed the latest builds of Remote panel and print driver for my 7900. It adds the new paper profiles to the bundle, is a simpler print dialog with less user customization, and fewer choices for settings. What was really bad, is I couldn't print after the instal! For whatever reason, the new version of print watcher couldn't launch, so nothing ever made it to the printer. There is no uninstall, so I had to manually remove everything. Then re-loaded my previous (thank goodness I saved them) disk images for the print driver and remote panel. Then I got to rebuild all my printing presets. Oh what joy...
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
LOL! No, just kicked my own butt for breaking my own cardinal rule --- NEVER be an early adopter of firmware for a piece of equipment that is working perfectly.

:rolleyes:
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
To clarify, here's my issue. I can't believe Epson would put up a new driver that didn't work. Ergo, I assume I must have done something wrong during installation. However I did what they said to do. I even tried re-installing the latest builds after nuking everything, but it still didn't work. BUT, I did NOT install the "common updater" (because I didn't understand what specifically it was for) and maybe I should have?

Notwithstanding, I would wait until somebody confirms they have that driver and new remote panel/print watcher up and running on Mac 10.6.3 before I downloaded it...
 

kweide

New member
I just made my own disastrous experiences with fxxxxx R800 and SL 10.6.3. That is the end of EPSON ! So much bullxxxxxx in printouts never seen before.....

I never though a manufacturer leaves its own products in the dark......with corrupted and inconsistantly working drivers.
So, hello HP, hello Canon.... lets check out your nice printers
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Update:

Okay, I cannot stand it when something isn't working and I had some free time today so I decided to experiment a bit further. First off, I backed up my OS so I had an easy way to revert to a working state. I now installed the "Common Updater." It ran, and as far as I could tell it changed nothing. The package had the same contents, no new paper profiles and still printed as normal. So far so good.

Next I held my breath and loaded the new driver. It ran. Interesting note is after I dragged the disk image to the trash, the trash wouldn't empty as some EFP module is still being used. I had noticed this before and can confirm a computer restart clears whatever it is -- but it is disturbing. Anyway, I can confirm this does indeed add the newest paper profiles. Best part is I could still print normally AND the UI is present just as it was in prior form. Comforting.

So I bit my lip and ran the Remote Panel update. This also ran normally, and added an App icon shortcut to the desktop. I confirmed this was the same app as loaded in the remote panel 2 package. Best part, the printer prints normally, at least as far as I can tell. So success!

Conclusion: All I can assume is the Common Updater has to be installed for everything down the line to work properly.



One other FWIW. I use Epson's Exhibition Fine Art paper on occasion. The current Epson stand alone profile for it is very good, but requires you to use to create a custom media choice using Epson's PPP Luster paper and set up an increased ink density of +12% under advanced media control. I have obviously done that and results are excellent. However, now that paper is a media choice in the driver, we no longer need that -- at least I assume that, but have not printed a test print on it yet to confirm -- so just a head's up to modify that particular preset appropriately if you have one.
 

ustein

Contributing Editor
LOL! No, just kicked my own butt for breaking my own cardinal rule --- NEVER be an early adopter of firmware for a piece of equipment that is working perfectly.

:rolleyes:
Jack, could be also to make an OS backup before installing new drivers. You reminded me.
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Jack, could be also to make an OS backup before installing new drivers. You reminded me.
Exactly -- that's what I did this morning. Usually, I never bother since I run a scheduled back up of my OS every day, so always have that. The issue on the day I added the new print driver was I had just spent several hours reconfiguring my imap email account (had to reimport around 20,000 emails). So it was stupid of me not to back up again after that and before the printer update. I hope I will not make that mistake again.
 
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