SANE/Scanner-specific problems
This article contains scanner or manufacturer-specific instructions for SANE.
BenQ/Acer
If you own an USB scanner from Acer (now BenQ), you need to download a suitable firmware binary and configure /etc/sane.d/snapscan.conf
.
- Find out which model you own and take note of the USB ID:
$ lsusb
Bus 002 Device 010: ID 04a5:20b0 Acer Peripherals Inc. (now BenQ Corp.) S2W 3300U/4300U
- Go to snapscan main page and see whether your scanner is supported and which firmware you need (e.g,
u176v046.bin
). - Search the firmware image on the Internet and download it to
/usr/share/sane/snapscan/
. - Edit the head of
/etc/sane.d/snapscan.conf
and configure the following two lines:
firmware /usr/share/sane/snapscan/u176v046.bin /dev/usb/scanner0 bus=usb
Brother
In order to install a Brother scanner or printer/scanner combo you need the right driver. To find the right one, search for your model at the Brother Linux scanner page.
Then, install the appropriate package:
- brscan2AUR
- brscan3AUR
- brscan4AUR
- libsane-dsseriesAUR
Now, the scanner should be recognized by SANE.
For network scanners, Brother provides a different configuration tool for each brscan version (eg. brsaneconfig2 for brscan2 compatible devices):
# brsaneconfig2 -a name=<ScannerName> model=<ScannerModel> ip=<ScannerIP>
Example:
# brsaneconfig2 -a name=SCANNER_DCP770CW model=DCP-770CW ip=192.168.0.110
Network Scanning
In case of network scanning, e.g. by WiFi, Sane may still be unable to find the scanner. If so, you need to specify the IP address of the scanner in the /etc/sane.d/net.conf
file.
Now use scanimage --check-devices
to check whether sane is able to find your scanner. If not, further check that Sane expects this device through the network (see [1]). Check that /etc/sane.d/dll.conf
contains brotherX
, where the X
stands for the brscan version from above. If nothing was found, add brotherX
to the end of the file.
Invalid argument
If all the necessary packages are installed but you still get the "invalid argument" error this could mean that the configuration file has been corrupted. Run the following command (in case of brscan4):
# brsaneconfig4 -d
The output should narrow down the problem. Most likely the connection isn't setup correctly. In case of a network scanner check if the IP address is right by opening the /etc/opt/brother/scanner/brscan4//brsanenetdevice4.cfg
with an editor. In case of a USB connection check if the path to the scanner in the configuration file is setup correctly. For that compare the values of the lsusb
command with your configuration file and change them if necessary.
Scan-key-tool
Brother has released a tool to enable scanning to be triggered by user interaction with the scanner itself (e.g. by selecting one of "Scan to email", "Scan to image", etc. on the scanner keypad) rather than by an attached computer. This can be set up by installing the brscan-skeyAUR package and starting brscan-skey.service
using systemd. Note that by default this service runs as the brscan-skey user which is created by the package, whose home directory is located at /srv/brscan-skey
.
Brother supplies some default scripts that are executed when a scan type is selected on the keypad. These may require the installation of some optional dependencies of the brscan-skeyAUR package. For all options apart from "Scan to email" the resulting output can be found inside $HOME/brscan
, with $HOME
the home directory of the user running this tool (so /srv/brscan-skey
if started via systemd as a systemwide process).
It is possible to change what action takes place when a given type of scan is selected on the keypad. This is done by editing /opt/brother/scanner/brscan-skey/brscan-skey-0.2.4-0.cfg
. For each variable SCAN_COMMAND
in IMAGE
, OCR
, EMAIL
, FILE
, the command
$ $SCAN_COMMAND $SCANNER_DEVICE $SCANNER_FRIENDLY_NAME
is executed when the corresponding scan type is selected. Note that $SCAN_COMMAND
is not quoted so may specify more than one positional parameter in the final command that is executed. $SCANNER_DEVICE
refers to the name of the device that should be specified to a sane frontend (e.g. via the --device-name
flag when using scanimage
), for example brother3:bus4;dev2
. $SCANNER_FRIENDLY_NAME
is the human-readable name of the scanner.
xsane crashes
If xsane crashes with message "=bugchk_free(ptr==(nil))@brother_modelinf.c(482)
", then you need to create the link /usr/local/Brother -> /usr/share/brother
.
Canon
Scanning over the network with Canon Pixma all-in-one printer/scanners
Find out your printer/scanner's IP address, and add it on a new line to /etc/sane.d/pixma.conf
in the format bjnp://10.0.0.20
.
Sane should now find your device. For more details refer to man sane-pixma
.
Cannot read scanner make and model
If you have a Canon multi function printer/scanner and get an error message of the following kind:
Cannot read mac address, skipping this scanner Cannot read scanner make & model: bjnp://
and the scanner refuses to connect, then it may be because you have a newer scanner using the mfnp, and not the bjnp protocol. Unfortunately, this scanner may not be supported (yet) by the current sane version. However, you can install sane-gitAUR to get a version supporting mfnp reasonably well. (And make sure that the scanner is in "remote" scanning mode - otherwise it will not communicate it's scanning capabilities over the network at all)
Epson
With Epson scanners, you can use "Image Scan! for Linux".
- Install the iscan package
- Install the appropriate iscan-plugin package for your scanner (for example, iscan-plugin-gt-x820AUR for the Epson Perfection Photo V600)
- Reboot, so that udev will recognize the device as a scanner and apply appropriate permissions
For network (including Wi-Fi) scanners, install iscan and iscan-plugin-networkAUR, then edit /etc/sane.d/epkowa.conf
and add the line:
net {IP_OF_SCANNER}
Epson Perfection 1270
For Epson Perfection 1270, you also need a firmware named esfw3e.bin
. It can be obtained by installing the Windows driver.
Modify the configuration file of the snapscan backend, /etc/sane.d/snapscan.conf
. Change the firmware path line with yours:
# Change to the fully qualified filename of your firmware file, if # firmware upload is needed by the scanner firmware /mnt/mydata/Backups/firmware/esfw3e.bin
And add the following line in the end or anywhere you like
# Epson Perfection 1270 usb 0x04b8 0x0120
You can get such code information (usb 0x04b8 0x0120
) by sane-find-scanner command.
Also add such information lines to /etc/hotplug/usb/libsane.usermap
to setup your privilege, like:
# Epson Perfection 1270 libusbscanner 0x0003 0x04b8 0x0120 0x0000 0x0000 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00000000
Replug scanner, you have a working Epson Perfection 1270 now.
- To prevent
scanimage: sane_start: Error during device I/O
and hangup of the scanner itself, when trying to scan with ADF (automatic document feed) enabled, I had to remove or comment out all Backends from/etc/sane.d/dll.conf
and instead just add this to the file:snapscan
Finally. If you still get the Error I/O
messages try to check the transportation lock of the scanner. It is on the bottom of the scanner. It must be opened.
Epson Perfection 1670/2480/2580/3490/3590
Make sure to download the correct firmware for your Epson model. You can get an overview of some models and their drivers here and here. The download links of the firmware are broken, but you can use this link as alternative instead. Make sure to change the firmware filename of the link suiting your model. If you want to download and extract the firmware sources from the official epson sites yourself you can use this guide.
As an alternative you can also install the AUR package sane-epson-perfection-firmwareAUR which will download the firmware from the official sources, extract the binary and install those to /usr/share/sane/snapscan/
.
Modify the configuration file of the snapscan backend, /etc/sane.d/snapscan.conf
. Change the firmware path line with yours:
# Change to the fully qualified filename of your firmware file, if # firmware upload is needed by the scanner firmware /usr/share/sane/snapscan/esfw52.bin
Other modifications were not needed for the Epson Perfection 3590 and might not be for other models as well. If you still have problems it can also help if you completely remove the iscan package.
Fujitsu
S300M
For the operation of the scanner S300M a firmware file /usr/share/sane/epjitsu/300M_0C00.nal
is required, which can be downloaded here, or extracted from the Windows driver.
HP
If your HP device is supported by hplip, install the install the hplip package.
The latter comes with 3 tools:
-
hp-setup
to add and setup the device -
hp-plugin
is the 'HPLIP Plugin Download and Install Utility'. -
hp-scan
is the 'HPLIP Scan Utility'. If you need that tool, you will need to install python-pillow.
hp-setup
requires Python Qt4 when run using the GUI (which is the default). To avoid installing the old Qt4 toolchain, you can run hp-setup in CLI using -i
as argument.
If your device is plugged as USB, run hp-setup
as root and follow the on screen instructions.
If your devices is connected on the network, run hp-setup
like this:
# hp-setup <printer ip>
Mustek
BearPaw 2400CU
Works with sane-gt68xx (sane-gt68xx-firmware)
Samsung
For some Samsung MFP printers you may need to edit /etc/sane.d/xerox_mfp.conf
.
example entry:
#Samsung SCX-3200 usb 0x04e8 0x3441
Change the printer model as needed. You can get the idVendor and idProduct code with lsusb
. See this thread.
When plugging in a usb2 printer/scanner to a usb3 interface there is currently a bug in the xhci kernel code that causes the xsane process to hang when the scanner is connected. In the event of a multi-function Samsung printer having an ethernet or wireless interface then it is possible to access the scanner over the network rather than the usb interface by adding in a line to the file /etc/sane.d/xerox_mfp.conf such as
#Samsung scx4500w wireless ip network address tcp xx.xx.xx.xx
where xx.xx.xx.xx is the static ip address of the printer.
Then when xsane starts up you can choose the network tcp access option instead of the usb line, and the scanner will be accessed via the network instead of the usb port and avoid the current usb3 issues.