c480fw Gibberish Printing from the Mac

[igormat]

Hello,

I have macOS CAtalina 10.15.4 installed on my laptop. Printer Samsung c480fw is connected over WiFi. I'm trying to print PDF but printer is printing only gibberish. But in the same time, printing from iPhone is working fine.

Could you please give me a link to the latest drivers version?

Thank you.

[submarine8]

This here should solve your problems.

[igormat]

Unfortunately, it didn|t help. Maybe I installed it wrong, do you have manual?

[submarine8]

Hm...

We need to check if the install succeeded.

Follow this (from Mac support page):

Make sure you have the latest software

Make sure you have the correct version of your printer’s software (also called its printer driver). If you’re using a printer that another user is sharing, make sure you’re both using the same version of the printer software.

1. On your Mac, to find out which version of printer software you’re using, choose Apple menu

   

    > System Preferences on your Mac.

2. Click Printers & Scanners, then select the printer.

3. Click Options & Supplies, then click General. Note the driver version.

What's the version number you see?

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[igormat]

I see version 2.0

[submarine8]

Hm... It seems that the driver was not installed indeed.

First, what exactly happened when you tried using the dmg file I linked to in my first post? Any error messages / reports of success?

I assume that running the installer (probably included in the file) should be all you need to do so this would be the easier way. I would try that again if I were you.

As an alternative, you could try using airprint instead. That should work just fine. See here (add with different settings) or here.

Please note though that I advise against removing your printer unless you feel comfortable reinstalling it. I am not a Mac user myself so it might be difficult for me to guide you.

Again, start by describing the installation process you faced with the dmg file.  We should move on to the alternatives (one of which is described above) only once we've determined that there is indeed a problem / mystery we cannot solve with the dmg file.

[igormat]

There were no errors.

The printer is already connected via AirPrint.

[BruceWalkerToo · Accepted solution]

Guys, I have this exact same problem on three systems (two 5K iMacs and a Macbook Pro). I have messed around with it for many hours already and I am pleased to say I have finally managed to get it to work. But no thanks to HP or Samsung as this whole printing thing is ugly.

Here is the recipe to getting your Samsung printer printing on MacOS X 10.15 Catalina:

1. Download the new March 2, 2020 driver (V3.91.00) from the link provided above in the thread.
2. Double-click the freshly downloaded Samsung_Mac_10.15_Driver_V3.91.00.dmg file.
3. Double-click the folder icon labelled MAC_Printer
4. Double-click the installer package labelled Printer Driver.pkg
5. Click Continue
6. Click Install
7. Supply your admin password
8. Click Add Printer
9. Find your printer in the list and select it; after a few seconds you should now see the Name appear below.
10. Change the Use: selection to Samsung XXXX Series (ie matching your printer)
11. If that choice is missing, choose Select Software... and scroll the list until you see your Samsung model series; select it and click OK.
12. Now click Add (bottom-right corner)
13. Finish up the package install and close the Finder windows that got opened.
14. Go into Preferences -> Printers & Scanners, choose your Samsung printer, click Options & Supplies... go to the Options tab and enable the Duplex Unit (assuming yours has one).

Note: do not choose Use: AirPrint in steps 10-11 or you will be right back where you started -- gibberish chararcters.

Caveat:

The Printer Utility that gets installed by the driver installer will not launch. If you go into Preferences -> Printers & Scanners, choose your Samsung printer, click Options & Supplies... go to the Utility tab and click Open Printer Utility, you will get a warning popup: "macOS cannot verify that this app is free from malware"  and offer to trash it for you. (If you take it up on that offer it will report sadly that it can't even do that.)

I hope this helps a few folks. Cheers!

[submarine8]

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@BruceWalkerToo wrote:

Guys, I have this exact same problem on three systems (two 5K iMacs and a Macbook Pro). I have messed around with it for many hours already and I am pleased to say I have finally managed to get it to work. But no thanks to HP or Samsung as this whole printing thing is ugly.

Here is the recipe to getting your Samsung printer printing on MacOS X 10.15 Catalina:

1. Download the new March 2, 2020 driver (V3.91.00) from the link provided above in the thread.
2. Double-click the freshly downloaded Samsung_Mac_10.15_Driver_V3.91.00.dmg file.
3. Double-click the folder icon labelled MAC_Printer
4. Double-click the installer package labelled Printer Driver.pkg
5. Click Continue
6. Click Install
7. Supply your admin password
8. Click Add Printer
9. Find your printer in the list and select it; after a few seconds you should now see the Name appear below.
10. Change the Use: selection to Samsung XXXX Series (ie matching your printer)
11. If that choice is missing, choose Select Software... and scroll the list until you see your Samsung model series; select it and click OK.
12. Now click Add (bottom-right corner)
13. Finish up the package install and close the Finder windows that got opened.
14. Go into Preferences -> Printers & Scanners, choose your Samsung printer, click Options & Supplies... go to the Options tab and enable the Duplex Unit (assuming yours has one).

Note: do not choose Use: AirPrint in steps 10-11 or you will be right back where you started -- gibberish chararcters.

Caveat:

The Printer Utility that gets installed by the driver installer will not launch. If you go into Preferences -> Printers & Scanners, choose your Samsung printer, click Options & Supplies... go to the Utility tab and click Open Printer Utility, you will get a warning popup: "macOS cannot verify that this app is free from malware"  and offer to trash it for you. (If you take it up on that offer it will report sadly that it can't even do that.)

I hope this helps a few folks. Cheers!

---

Many thanks for describing the installation process. I hope it will help those facing the problem.

What confuses me is why Air Printing (described here) fails you. It should not care one bit about whatever issues there are with the HP driver (apparently mended by the updated & working version) and should hence work just fine according to HP. Then again, who cares, as long as the updated HP driver seems to do the trick 🙂

[BruceWalkerToo]

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@submarine8 wrote:

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@BruceWalkerToo wrote:

Here is the recipe to getting your Samsung printer printing on MacOS X 10.15 Catalina:

---

Many thanks for describing the installation process. I hope it will help those facing the problem.

What confuses me is why Air Printing (described here) fails you. It should not care one bit about whatever issues there are with the HP driver (apparently mended by the updated & working version) and should hence work just fine according to HP. Then again, who cares, as long as the updated HP driver seems to do the trick 🙂

---

You're welcome.

I believe that AirPrint is designed to be a smart protocol that determines the right driver to use automatically. For it to work the Samsung firmware would have to be updated too, not just the MacOS X driver. I expect that the old firmware in the Samsung (2017-2018) is telling the Mac the wrong info about what driver to assume. (When you let AirPrint choose the printer driver the driver version reported is 2.0, not 3.91.)

I also found that you can simply choose "generic PCL" rather than any specific Samsung model and skip installing Samsung drivers at all and that kind of works, but of course with reduced functionality. (The Mac will not know about the envelope/single-sheet feeder or other printer features beyond duplex.)