Fixing a scanner broken by the Feisty upgrade
Posted by Jerry on May 24th, 2007 
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If you have been using a USB scanner and upgrade from Edgy to Feisty, you may find that your scanner no longer works.
These notes may help. There is a long thread about this check here . The problem seems to lie in the usb suspend functions built into Feisty’s new kernel in order to keep laptop users happy.Here are a few tricks taken from the above thread that might get your scanner going again. They did for me.
SUMMARY
0. Download & install scanbuttond using adept or any preferred tool
At the console …
1. list usb devices : lsusb
2. run scanbuttond : scanbuttond -r 1000000
3. list available imaging devices : scanimage -L
4. Test basic scanner operation : scanimage -T -d
5. Test gui scanner operation : xsane
DETAIL
0. Use adept or whatever tool you prefer to install the “scanbuttond” package.use the following command to install scanbuttond
sudo aptitude install scanbuttond
This is a daemon that will poll your scanner to see if any of its buttons have been pressed. You don’t need to press a button - your scanner may not even have one. The point seems to be that the daemon pokes the scanner at an interval you specify thereby keeping it awake and and able to respond to other programs. For more information, see the above thread and/or http://scanbuttond.sourceforge.net/
1. List the currently known USB devices & check that your scanner is in the list.
To do this, open a console & enter “lsusb” at the prompt. (without quotes of course). Here’s a typical output …
john@john-desktop:~$ lsusb
Bus 005 Device 007: ID 04a9:2206 Canon, Inc. CanoScan N650U/N656U
Bus 005 Device 006: ID 0aec:3260 Neodio Technologies Corp. 7-in-1 Card Reader
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 046d:c408 Logitech, Inc. Marble Mouse (4-button)
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Here we see that a CanoScan N650U is available as device 007 on bus 005. These numbers matter and they are tricky because they can change. Typically, if you unplug, then reconnect the scanner the device number is likely to change. Note the numbers that appear on your own system for use later. If your scanner doesn’t appear in the USB devices list, then, sorry, this article won’t help you.
2.Start the scan button daemon
Again at the console prompt, enter “scanbuttond -r 1000000″ The number here is the retry (polling) interval in micro-seconds. The value shown here is pretty much the consensus that emerged in the discussion thread. If you later want to stop the daemon, issue the command “killall scanbuttond”
3. Check the status of your scanner from the command line - enter “scanimage -L”.
Scanimage is a command line tool for reading images from scanners and cameras. It works through the sane scanner access interface in much the same way as the GUI scanning tools. It has a useful manual entry. (To see this, as always, enter “man scanimage” at the prompt)
scanimage -L gives a list of the imaging devices currently available throught the sane interface. Here’s a typical output …
john@john-desktop:~$ scanimage -L
device `v4l:/dev/video0′ is a Noname BT878 video (Leadtek WinFast 20 virtual device
device `plustek:libusb:005:007′ is a Canon N650U/N656U USB flatbed scanner
Here we see two available devices, most importantly the Canon scanner in my system. Note the device name & syntax for subsequent testing. Here it is “plustek:libusb:005:007″. This says that the plustek package is working through libusb to device 007 on bus 005. Many scanners are run this way but some are not. A specific manufacturer, e.g HP, might appear in place of plustek. The bus and device numbers should match those obtained previously with the lsusb command
4. Test operation of the scanner from the command line - enter “scanimage -T -d
where is the device id show by the previous command, e.g. here we would enter “scanimage -T -d plustek:libusb:005:007″
If all is well, the scanner should start making operating noises and some pass/fail test results will be shown in the console window.
A typical example on my system …’
john@john-desktop:~$ scanimage -T -d plustek:libusb:005:007
scanimage: scanning image of size 202×150 pixels at 24 bits/pixel
scanimage: acquiring RGB frame, 8 bits/sample
scanimage: reading one scanline, 606 bytes… PASS
scanimage: reading one byte… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 2 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 4 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 8 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 16 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 32 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 64 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 128 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 256 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 512 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 1024 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 1023 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 511 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 255 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 127 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 63 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 31 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 15 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 7 bytes… PASS
scanimage: stepped read, 3 bytes… PASS
5. Test operation of the scanner with the xsane gui interface or some other scanner program.
eg enter “xsane” at the console prompt. On startup, xsane shows a device selection dialog where you can check that the bus & device numbers match those previously noted. Xsane also has a good manual entry (man xsane)
If xsane runs the scanner successfully, then so should other programs - Gimp, Kooka, OpenOffice etc.
May 26th, 2007 at 9:06 am
scanimage is not available on my default Kubuntu Feisty system. Do I have to add a repository in order to install it?
May 26th, 2007 at 11:32 pm
THANKS! Saved ME a trip (or two) to Staples…Thanks Again!!!
May 27th, 2007 at 9:11 am
Luke: I’m using Ubuntu, but it should be the same for you; when I tried to run scanimage on my system it said:
—
$ scanimage
The program ’scanimage’ is currently not installed. You can install it by typing:
sudo apt-get install sane-utils
Make sure you have the ‘universe’ component enabled
—
May 27th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
AFAIK, scanimage and other command line utilities for SANE are available in the sane-utils package which is part of the standard repositories under Feisty (and previous xUbuntus). Run adept, enter “sane” in the search box and see what turns up.
I replied quite a bit earlier to this but that reply seems to have vanished into interstitial cyberspace space. Maybe this one will fare better.
May 27th, 2007 at 8:22 pm
Wow, thanks for the solution. My scanner worked haltingly and very slowly. Now it works once again. Question: Will the daemon have to be started each login or will it stay running in each session?
Thanks again.
Gregg
May 29th, 2007 at 9:39 pm
USB Scanners Under Ubuntu Feisty…
Feisty broke my scanner.
Well, I didn’t actually break it. But my scanner, which had worked like a champ up until I upgraded to Feisty, stopped working after the upgrade.
I tested the scanner on a different computer that is not running Feisty and…
May 29th, 2007 at 10:55 pm
Thank you for your workaround. i am using kubuntu 7.04 with an agfa snapscan 1212U. After installed and run scanbuttond i have used Kooka with no more problem.
Thank you again
June 5th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
Thanks,
My setup didnt like the -d option on
4. Test basic scanner operation : scanimage -T -d
so I left out ‘-d’ and everything now works OK
June 15th, 2007 at 5:38 am
The Scanner CanonLide25 works fine after scanbuttond “-r 1000000″ from the console. But i have one question, how can i make this “scanbuttond -r 1000000″ runnimg after the Computer is started automatic ?
June 15th, 2007 at 3:19 pm
I’m glad this seems to have helped a few people.
A few things about this tip, esp. a correction to the original text …
Line “4. Test Basic scanner operation … ” is wrong. It should say “scanimage -T -d “yourdevice”
where “yourdevice” is something like plustek:libusb:005:008 (or whatever). I think that when originally entering the text I used the gt. & lt. signs () and the message board software tossed them out as bad html. Sorry about that. I guess most folk will have figured that out, but if you just use “scanimage -T -d” on the command line, then nothing happens or maybe you get an error message.
Auto running scanbuttond at boot time : Arthus, and others privately, asked how the scanbuttond command could be issued automatically at boot up rather than being entered manually every time at the console. The short answer is yes, you can put it in a boot-up script but, this being Linux, it isn’t as easy as just tossing the statement into our trusty autoexec.bat file. I think an explanation is too long to put here but I’ll do a separate tip on it shortly. Meanwhile, if you want to pursue this immediately, have a look at http://kudos.berlios.de/kf/kf1.html#zzboot.
June 20th, 2007 at 11:40 am
John,
People like you are the reason I switched to Ubuntu. It took some work to find someone whose tut made sense.
Your tut worked flawlessly. Thanks a bunch John and Ubuntu Geek.
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:52 am
Scanning Problems Through a USB Hub
The following may help if you are still be having problems with scanner operation despite using scanbuttond.
My scanner would work about 1 time in 10, apparently depending on which USB device port it was allocated when it was plugged in. I normally connect it through a USB hub. When I removed the hub and used a direct USB connection instead, operation was then 100% reliable. I tried both powered & non powered hubs & the problem was reproduced immediately in both cases.
So - worth a try if you still have the problems and are working through a hub.
- J
June 30th, 2007 at 3:32 am
Thankyou, thankyou. Scanner working perfectly again.
July 3rd, 2007 at 3:46 pm
Woow! It works!
Thanks a lot guy !
If you pass in the belgium give a mail and I offer u a special beer !
July 9th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
Thanks a lot!!!
This is not a bug with Ubuntu, since I have had the same issue on Fedora 7. The scanner (Canon Lide 25) worked fine on an older version of Fedora. The workaround worked well. This probably a bug in the upgraded kernel.
August 7th, 2007 at 10:26 am
Fantastisch (fantastic); het werkt (it works.
A shame (for Canonical) that this was not posted from the beginning.
Anyway: end good, all good.
August 19th, 2007 at 11:29 am
Thank you very much, it worked me also, you helped me a lot!
August 24th, 2007 at 9:45 pm
Everything worked till step 4 (with exclusion of the parameter “-d” in step 4), but after starting xsane I got again the error message and even step 3 is not working any more. Do you have some idea what is wrong?
I’m using Scapscan 1212U.
August 25th, 2007 at 3:04 am
Thanks for the help.
This worked perfect with a Cannon N1240U.
I enjoy Linux but am a beginner with many of the commands.
This was a great help.
October 1st, 2007 at 12:04 pm
I have just entered scanbuttond into the session startup programs with the command “scanbuttond -r 1000000″ . Restarted and my Canonlide30 was still working ok.
Bob
February 23rd, 2008 at 12:07 pm
This step didn’t work for me nothing happens. Even when I remove the -d flag. Now that my Windows XP disc is broken I guess I have to make a 5 GB Ubuntu Dapper 6.06 install just for my crappy CanonScan 630u.
“scanimage -T -d canon630u:libusb:003:003″
Soooo disappointing
February 23rd, 2008 at 4:37 pm
In reply to Mike above on 23 Feb 2008.
scanimage -T -d canon630u:libusb:003:003
- that’s the wrong scanimage command. Perhaps my explanation wasn’t clear enough.
Try scanimage -T -d plustek:libusb:003:003
Canon scanners (and several others) use the generic, plustek driver, not one of their own.
So scanimage -T -d canon630u:libusb etc won’t work.
Good luck with it. I wonder if this will eventually be fixed by canonical in one of the new versions.
As a user, I don’t know, and I don’t care, who “owns” this problem but the fact that it has persisted for over a year and 2 Ubuntu versions is pretty bloody poor, IMO
Regards to all,
JohnC
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Vote to get this fixed
Ubuntu are running a “brainstorm” about what needs to be improved.
People whov’e had this scanner problem might care to vote for the scanner fix.
See http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/2657/
JohnC
April 8th, 2008 at 6:38 pm
This is what i come up with
Bus 004 Device 004: ID 03f0:2305 Hewlett-Packard ScanJet 3970c
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 001 Device 010: ID 03f0:0f07 Hewlett-Packard
Bus 001 Device 009: ID 0733:0401 ViewQuest Technologies, Inc. CS330 WebCam
Bus 001 Device 008: ID 058f:9254 Alcor Micro Corp. Hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
dev/bus/usb/004/004 was change to a+w
wb0blv2@wb0blv2-desktop:~$ scanimage -L
device `v4l:/dev/video0′ is a Noname Intel Create and Share virtual device
device `hp3900:libusb:004:004′ is a Hewlett-Packard Scanjet 3970 flatbed scanner
wb0blv2@wb0blv2-desktop:~$ scanimage -T -d hp3900:libusb:004:004
scanimage: scanning image of size 1×1 pixels at 24 bits/pixel
scanimage: acquiring RGB frame, 8 bits/sample
scanimage: reading one scanline, 3 bytes… PASS
scanimage: reading one byte… FAIL Error: End of file
November 27th, 2008 at 8:02 am
I used all you said and started it with the plustek driver…it worked however it will not be found by xsane…using ubuntu 7.10 is a canon 670 /676 Lide 20
December 16th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
I have UBUNTU 8.10 - Scanner Canon Lide 25
I did al the way:
root@personal-laptop:~# scanimage -L
device `plustek:libusb:005:012′ is a Canon CanoScan LiDE25 flatbed scanner
root@personal-laptop:~# scanimage -T -d plustek:libusb:005:012
scanimage: scanning image of size 202×150 pixels at 24 bits/pixel
scanimage: acquiring RGB frame, 8 bits/sample
scanimage: reading one scanline, 606 bytes… FAIL Error: Operation was cancelled
what is this error ??
When I used XSANE - i have the mesagge: failed creating archive, no permission (falló al crear el archivo, permiso denegado)
Any help ??
December 31st, 2008 at 6:53 am
After 3 years using Ubuntu as default operating system I’m seriously considering going back to Windows, with scanners being top of the list as reason to go.
After every single upgrade (2 x per year) I had to spend a couple of days troubleshooting issues to get scanners working.
Now again on 8.10 my BenQ/Acer 640BT. Most of the help on the net also make huge assumptions that everyone on the planet knows about where to get the “firmware” files for a particular scanner, knows everything about non-obvious security (being a member of groups such a “scanner” doesn’t give you the permission to use the scanner), references to directories that doesn’t exist, kernel settings for which there no way for the layman to check … and the list go on …..
Maybe I can get diploma or degree in getting scanners to work on Ubuntu …..