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Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

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Onsemeliot
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Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#1 Post by Onsemeliot »

There is a GNU/Linux driver from the company but I wonder if somebody else might have found a way to use the scanner with a free driver instead - even if with limited functionality.
README wrote:The components in the ``plugins/`` folder are non-free, in the sense that they do not give you all the freedoms normally associated with `Free Software` [...] With the exception of the "network" plugin (only included with the generic iscan-bundle) these plugins are needed for the scanner ...


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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#3 Post by Onsemeliot »

Thank you for your fast reply, Shep. If I interpret it right (I can't read anything on the linked Japanese page) the forum entry is referring to the same drivers I linked. It is nice that Epson actually provides a GNU/Linux driver. But I would prefer a free driver (if available) even if it has limited functionality. The main obstacle seems to be that the device needs to be recognised first before anything else can happen.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#4 Post by arzgi »

Onsemeliot wrote:Thank you for your fast reply, Shep. If I interpret it right (I can't read anything on the linked Japanese page) the forum entry is referring to the same drivers I linked. It is nice that Epson actually provides a GNU/Linux driver. But I would prefer a free driver (if available) even if it has limited functionality. The main obstacle seems to be that the device needs to be recognised first before anything else can happen.
https://www.openprinting.org/printers/ does not contain any info about your printer. That site is good place to start, when you are are going to buy a printer.

Also doing we search:

Code: Select all

[your printer] linux
is helpfull.

I did both, and all I could find, was the driver Epson provides. You are lucky there is that one. Next time solve linux combatibility before hand.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#5 Post by Onsemeliot »

arzgi wrote:all I could find, was the driver Epson provides. You are lucky there is that one. Next time solve linux combatibility before hand.
Me too. I just wasn't sure if I did miss something important. Often printers for example work just fine for most purposes with generic free drivers.

This actually isn't my scanner. All the time I give people the same advice as you. Unfortunately, most of them come to me only after they bought any random hardware and run into problems with it. Normally finding an official GNU/Linux driver is great. This time it's special because the person doesn't just want to run a free OS but wants to omit non-free drivers also. Therefore, I at least wanted to try to find an alternative solution to actually buying pre-selected new hardware.

Sometimes I wish I could program. But it is quite hard to get from basics to something actually useful like writing a free driver.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#6 Post by shep »

My understanding is that the Epson Perfection v330 Photo is a scanner:
https://epson.com/Support/Scanners/Perf ... +X+10.10.x

An open, free driver for your Epson could arise from:
1) Epson releasing the driver specs and collaborating with the sane developers who write the code
2) A developer who reverse engineers the code without Epson's support
3) Epson utilizing scanner protocols for which a standard, opensource driver is available. In printing, the equivalent of this is PCL5/PCL6

What you have is that Epson wrote their own driver and did not release the source code under the GPL. The driver is a Free, as in free beer, download.

If using Free, as in OpenSource, drivers are important to you, you need to do pre-purchase research and let that guide your purchase decision. In a sense, vote with your money.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#7 Post by Onsemeliot »

shep wrote:If using Free, as in OpenSource, drivers are important to you, you need to do pre-purchase research and let that guide your purchase decision. In a sense, vote with your money.
I actually do that. This was just a request for someone else who didn't consult me before buying the hardware. But thanks for your response anyway.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#8 Post by debiman »

is the scanner actually not working without an additional driver?
you forgot to mention that in post #1.
or are you "just curious"?

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#9 Post by Onsemeliot »

debiman wrote:is the scanner actually not working without an additional driver?
Originally I helped that person with installing Debian on her very obscure system since because of an UEFI problem I couldn't get the system of her choice (Trisquel) to work there even if the life system worked perfectly well. Back then there wasn't enough time to care for this scanner but I offered her help if she would encounter problems. I figured it would be good to look for a solution in the mean time but she didn't contact me again for help. So I guess she has either found a solution or doesn't need to use that device on this system at all.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#10 Post by arochester »

is the scanner actually not working without an additional driver?
I have an Epson Perfection v600 photo. It will scan e.g. photos, but the light in the lid doesn't come on to scan slides or negatives. It only seems to work fully in Windows.

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Re: Is there a free driver for Epson Perfection v330 Photo?

#11 Post by Onsemeliot »

Thank you for the report on your experiences, arochester.

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