WSJ - Article on Linux netbooks

[Robin Laing]

Alan Cox wrote:
> O> is done by the host computer.  There are things the printer can do that
>> will break the printer.  We are talking about things like how long to
>> heat the little wire to flash-steam the ink etc.  Do it for too long and
>> you damage the wire.  On the mickysoft driver, this is all buried in a
>> binary blob and while folks could in theory binary edit it, they won't
>> for the most part.  In the OSS world, if they released sources, that
> 
> You honestly think the bad guys wouldn't just sniff the wire, disassemble
> the driver and write printer exploding worms given the chance.
> 
>> almost certainly wouldn't be as true.  This puts Lexmark in a very bad
>> position.  If they open it up they would need to figure out a way to
>> tell if a modified driver caused damage and not cover that damage under
>> warranty repairs.
> 
> I don't doubt that the printer control is done from the PC end, but I'd
> be suprised if Lexmark were dumb enough to just trust the PC commands.
> You don't DRM your toner cartridges and then act careless on the rest
> surely. I'd have thought they'd have DRM on the driver interface too !
> 
> Linux actually supports a fair number of "dumb" printers, usually by
> rasterising with ghostscript and then driving the rasteriser through some
> custom printer driver.
> 
> And printers are one area where the what to buy data is really quite good:
> 
> http://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/OpenPrinting
> 
> Alan
> 

I have owned Lexmark, Epson and HP.  I purchased a Lexmark when they had 
Linux drivers on their site.  It worked okay but never great and not all 
the features.  More issues with ink and heads.  Same issues that my 
Windows friends had.  Lexmark is now in the same levels as Microsoft for 
quality.

My Epson printers were great until one got into a weird state that I 
couldn't even talk to a support number without a credit card, even to 
ask where the local repair center was.  Printer became trash before I 
was off the phone.

HP has been great.  I just purchased an all-in-one to replace an HP 
printer that needs new heads (>$100) and I hooked it up using wireless 
network.  Opened HPLIP and it found the printer, set it up and all 
worked as expected.  Scanning and printing were perfect.

We use HP and Xerox at work and I would love to get a Xerox Phaser for 
home but that is out of my price range.  :)

I am getting a netbook or notebook for my daughter this summer and I am 
looking at what is going to be supplied with Linux out of the box.

This may be something to look at.
   http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/touchbook/

I doubt Fedora will run on it though.  Lack of KDE would be a problem 
for me. :)

-- 
Robin Laing