Now 14.04 doesn't like my printer

[MR ZenWiz]

On Mon, Sep 8, 2014 at 11:27 AM, MR ZenWiz <mrzenwiz at gmail.com> wrote:
:
> I'm now using the hpijs-pcl5e driver and that held up until I got
> printed what I needed.
>
This is just strange.  I bought an HP P1102W because I figured I'd
have better luck with an HP printer, and although it configured itself
perfectly, it refuses to print anything.

With the HPLIP drivers, I get "rendering completed" but no printout.
It complained about needing the hplip-plugin, which Synaptic couldn't
find, although it did find the hp-plugin (openhpl-plugin), and that
didn't work either (same symptoms). With the HPIJS drivers, I get
filter errors and no printout.

So I reconnected my Brother and it works fine with the HPIJS filter as before.

Now I get the joy of sending the HP back.  Saves me a fair chunk of
money, but this is more than a bit frustrating.  I can't imagine a
hapless user who knows nothing about Linux or how these things can
need coddling ever to switch to Linux, no matter how frustrating MS
Windows can be - some of these things just work (or never do) with
Windows, but I almost never had to battle like this with Windows to
get hardware to work properly.  (Some did and some never did.)

My son, who is good with computers but not a pro, has been using
Windows XP for seven years straight (he "needs" it for Adobe CS) and
his machine rarely crashes and gives him fewer headaches than mine
gives me.

Not that I'd ever go back - the stability of Linux, Xubuntu in
particular, is hard to beat and the environment is what I've been
using professionally for 28 years (Unix first, then Linux solid for
the past 7).  But I can totally understand why non-professional
computer users who have been on Windows for any length of time and
like anything about it would not switch.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

FWIW.
MR