Before starting the procedure outlined on the WLUG webpages on how to install this scanner, I entered the first instruction into a terminal.  The output was:

zed(a)zed-desktop ~ $ tail -f /var/log/messages Feb  2 14:31:51 zed-desktop sudo: pam_sm_authenticate: Called Feb  2 14:31:51 zed-desktop sudo: pam_sm_authenticate: username = [zed] Feb  2 14:43:16 zed-desktop kernel: [201541.333127] usb 2-1: USB disconnect, address 4 Feb  2 14:45:32 zed-desktop kernel: [201678.008023] usb 2-1: new full speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 5 Feb  2 14:45:33 zed-desktop kernel: [201678.222085] usb 2-1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice Feb  2 17:39:38 zed-desktop kernel: [212123.386301] scanimage[16779]: segfault at 68 ip 001e4852 sp bfd7afe4 error 4 in libpthread-2.10.1.so[1de000+15000] Feb  2 17:45:35 zed-desktop sudo: pam_sm_authenticate: Called Feb  2 17:45:35 zed-desktop sudo: pam_sm_authenticate: username = [zed] Feb  2 17:45:56 zed-desktop kernel: [212501.455456] scanimage[16875]: segfault at 68 ip 00386852 sp bfbeb654 error 4 in libpthread-2.10.1.so[380000+15000] Feb  2 18:02:34 zed-desktop kernel: [213499.605729] usb 2-1: USB disconnect, address 5

I had just turned the scanner off.

I have no idea what this means.  Perhaps someone does!

A segfault is never good: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Segmentation_fault Maybe you could generate some more debugging output: SANE_DEBUG_SNAPSCAN=255 scanimage -L 2>snapscan.log And then post the output in "snapscan.log" to the sane mailing list? http://www.sane-project.org/ Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Waikato, NZ http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ Ph. +64 (7) 858-5174