After moving my workstation to Ubuntu 26.04, I ran into a small problem with my old Dell B1165nfw Mono MFP.
Ubuntu automatically discovered the network printer without any issue. Unfortunately, the automatically selected driver was the wrong one.
The printer itself is quite old, and Dell’s original Linux driver package dates back many years. Still, the old driver turned out to work — with a little manual help.
The Dell Driver
I downloaded and extracted Dell’s original Linux driver package.
Inside the package I found the correct PPD:
Linux/noarch/at_opt/share/ppd/B1165nfw.ppd
Checking the PPD showed that it requires the following CUPS filter:
*cupsFilter: "application/vnd.cups-raster 0 rastertospl"
Fortunately, Dell also included a 64-bit version of that filter:
Linux/x86_64/rastertospl
Before installing it, I checked its dependencies:
ldd Linux/x86_64/rastertospl
Everything looked fine except for one missing library:
libscmssc.so => not found
That library was also included in the Dell package:
Linux/x86_64/libscmssc.so
Installing the Required Files
Instead of running Dell’s complete legacy installer, I decided to install only the components actually required by CUPS.
From the extracted cdroot directory:
sudo install -m 755 \
Linux/x86_64/rastertospl \
/usr/lib/cups/filter/rastertospl
sudo install -m 644 \
Linux/x86_64/libscmssc.so \
/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libscmssc.so
sudo ldconfig
I then verified that the filter could find its library:
ldd /usr/lib/cups/filter/rastertospl | grep -E 'scmssc|not found'
libscmssc.so was now resolved correctly.
Adding the Printer
Ubuntu had already discovered the B1165nfw on the network, so the remaining part was easy.
In the Ubuntu printer configuration I selected the option to provide my own PPD file and used:
B1165nfw.ppd
Ubuntu now identified the printer correctly as:
Dell B1165nfw Mono MFP
Test page sent.
It worked.
Lesson Learned
The interesting part was that Dell’s very old Linux driver still works on a modern Ubuntu installation.
The PPD alone, however, wasn’t enough.
The complete path is:
B1165nfw.ppd
|
v
CUPS
|
v
rastertospl
|
v
libscmssc.so
|
v
Dell B1165nfw
Instead of running an old installer as root and letting it install legacy Qt tools, scanner utilities and other components I don’t need, installing only the required PPD, CUPS filter and library turned out to be the cleaner solution.