Samsung CLP-610 on Debian / Ubuntu
I’ve had consistently good experience using Samsung printers with Linux and the CLP-610 is no exception.
The Samsung CLP-610 is an excellent network-ready color laser printer with a built in duplexer. I use the two-sided feature all the time as I prefer to use the minimum amount of paper necessary.
The printer is very connected – it supports PCL6, Samsung’s own language, IPP and LPR. In my opinion, the only way this printer could be improved is to build in stapler and hole-punch.
Samsung provides a script to install their system management software, but I generally prefer to avoid installing vendor supplied software whenever possible. Here’s an the easy way to install the printer on Debian / Ubuntu using the standard printer wizard.
(Note – this was done on Ubuntu 7.10, which is my current desktop.)
First, download the Unified Linux Driver from the Samsung.com support site. The file is 21 MBytes (!) because it contains a lot of stuff you don’t need (like a CUPs driver, printer manager, etc). The printer definitions file we need is approx 52 KBytes.
The filename is dated and looks like 20070927133811468_UnifieldLinuxDriver.tar.gz
Unzip this file to create a “cdroot” directory. This directory contains the latest Samsung printer definitions files.
Start the printer configuration wizard. The Samsung will show up if you have mDNS (default on Ubuntu).
Select “Provide PPD File” and click the (None) button to open a file browser.
Navigate to the PPD subdirectory located here, select the file and click forward.
./cdroot/Linux/noarch/at_opt/share/ppd/CLP-610splc.ppd
Enter some printer housekeeping information, click apply, and you’re done.
