On 31/05/2011 07:43, Andy Burns wrote:
Robin wrote:

On scanners, if you do not intend to
switch from XP soon then there are a lot of basic scanners going cheap
which are not compatible with Windows Vista/7.

Indeed HP seem to be using Win7 as something of a culling-point for
printers they consider to be "too old" and not releasing drivers for
them, when in fact the Vista drivers work just fine ... given how many
years and Windows versions they've supported HP LaserJet III and above
that's pretty shoddy.

Before Vista, Windows printer drivers were implemented in 'kernal-mode'
and now for security and stability they have to be 'user-mode' framework
compliant.

So some drivers for some old printers got rewritten when Vista launched.
Yeah, these should be OK on Windows 7 if they live bug free.

Panasonic gave up supporting my KX-P7510 laser after Windows 2000,
though the drivers did work OK'ish on Windows XP and Server 2003 (with
some adjustment to allow the kernal mode use).

I'm now using Xerox's Global Print driver on that for XP and Windows 7.

-&-

My Umax 1200S scanner is the oldest bit of computer kit still in regular
use here. 13 years, still scanning...

Bought for WinNT 4.0 in April 1998 with its own crappy ISA SCSI adaptor
(replaced by an Adaptec 2940) and a very earth leaky SMPS (ditched), I
massaged it though Windows 2000, XP, and Windows 7. The last official
driver release for that was for XP, it wasn't too hard to get going on 7.

Which is good. I'd hate to see it go!

--
Adrian C