Several requests about getting the scanner working on their OSX Lion install with the Dell 3115cn have made me write this post. Some have had trouble getting it to work through SMB. So here goes instructions on how to get your scanner working with OSX Lion via FTP. Please note that this doesn’t actually work the way one might first expect. When most people think of connecting a scanner to a computer they think of the computer doing the work by prompting the scanner to do the scanning. This isn’t actually the case with the 3115cn. It has the ability to do a scan server which is how we will set this up.
Setting up the computer
Step 1:
Open up System Prefs and find your computers IP Address under “Network”. *I recommend you set this manually or set it with a sticky static in your router so that you don’t have to continue to go in and change the IP information inside the printer.*
Step 2:
Open terminal and type the following command:
sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist
Step 3:
Close the terminal. At this point create a shared folder inside your documents (or anywhere else you’d like) called “Scans” by opening finder and Right clicking and selecting New Folder and naming it scans:
When complete you should see the following:
You can test by going to terminal and typing ftp
Setting Up the Scanner
Now that we have this working we’ll move on to configuring the Scanner of the Dell 3115cn. I assume you know the IP Address of your scanner (as far as I know you’re scanner will not work via USB with the Mac so You’ll have to give it an ip on the network). In my case I’ve setup the printer on 172.16.3.253 so that it’s on the same network as my machine. Open up your browser and type the ip you set for the printer into the address bar. You’ll see a Dell Printer Screen showing how much toner you have available. At any time you are prompted with a password enter Admin with a blank password (unless you’ve set it to something else)
Step 1:
After opening the browser click on the Address Book Button (this is where you’ll be prompted for the password as stated above).
Then navigate over to Server Address button and then click on the Create Button for 01 (if not in use … if it is move to 02 and so on). Also be sure you are on Server Address and not on E-Mail address (although you can setup a simple SMTP Connection there to allow for emailing you scanned files, although this requires a little mail server knowledge and requires you to goto Print Server Settings -> Print Server Settings -> Email Alert (but that’s for another tutorial))
You’ll see the following information:
The following Information should be entered:
Name: Any name you’d like to call this on the printers console screen.
Server Type: Tick the radial for FTP (The Default) since that’s how we configured it.
Server Address: Enter your ip address for your computer here (in my case 172.16.3.3 from above)
Server Port: 21 is the default FTP Port and should be entered here.
Login Name: Your “Short” username for your OSX account (ex: cpierce). This was the account name you used when you setup your Mac.
Login Password: Tick the Enable Password and enter your account password as entered above).
Share Name: Leave Blank.
Server Path: Enter “Documents/Scans” (without quotes).
Click apply New Settings button. You’ll get an Engrish style message saying something about “updating the data and operate it again later”. You will then see the following Screen.
At this point goto your Scan option on the Console of the Printer and try to scan. I hope this helps someone.
63 responses to “Dell 3115cn Scanner Support for OSX Lion”
Hey Chris!
Thanks for the post. I am getting a 016-781 SMB/FTP Error. This is the error I started to receive when I upgraded to Lion. Any idea what might cause this?
@raffi
On a side note, I do have PORT 139 open, i’ve tried it on both the scanner and computer. At one point, I also received a 016-782 Login Error as well, but the frequent one I receive is the 016+781 SMB/FTP error.
Hi Chris, had my DELL for sometime now, this 016-781 has always been a pain when changing anything!! Was in a Windows environment, but am now mac, first snow leopard and now lion. Tried all you wrote (so clear, thanks), now the but, I don’t get the ‘add a port for 139’. Had a look around, but nothing helped. Scanned my mac and came up with ports 88, 445, 57618 for my IPAdr. Turned the firewall off, no help. My config doesn’t have ethernet connected only WiFi. Any ideas??
@James
You might try opening terminal and checking like this:
mckay:~ cpierce$ telnet 172.16.3.3 139
Trying 172.16.3.3…
telnet: connect to address 172.16.3.3: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
mckay:~ cpierce$ telnet 172.16.3.1 139
Trying 172.16.3.1…
Connected to 172.16.3.1.
Escape character is ‘^]’.
as you can see the port is opened on 172.16.3.1 and is closed on port 172.16.3.3
Chris,
How can we open port 139? I think after looking at everything, I might have 139 closed. It use to work just fine under Leopard, but not now in Lion.
Chris,
Any luck with opening Port 139? I think that is my issue with the scanner not communicating with the computer. Everything else works fine.
@raffi
see the above comment to @James and tell me if it said connection refused or ^] for you?
Hi Chris,
I am getting a “Connection Refused” on both my main computer and the dell scanner…. i followed the instructions above and get the error of SMB/FTP 016-781 when I try to scan anything.
Chris, just to follow up, I’ve followed your instructions from top to bottom in regards to setting up the scan. Everything works great on the printer, expect for scanning. Hopefully that might help. If you need any screen shots let me know.
@cpierce
I did this but mine says refused..
I was getting same error “smb.ftp 016-781”
@Kory
Getting the same error as well.
guys if you’ll provide me some screen shots and results of your telnet sessions please let me know so that I can help you get this working.
Hi Chris,
sorry for not getting back sooner ;-( Simply an indication of how frustrating this issue is for me, now I HAVE to get it going.
Here’s what I got when checking for port 139 via the terminal:
Last login: Thu Oct 27 20:07:42 on console
imac:~ james$ telnet 172.16.3.3 139
Trying 172.16.3.3…
telnet: connect to address 172.16.3.3: Operation timed out
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
imac:~ james$ telnet 172.16.3.1 139
Trying 172.16.3.1…
telnet: connect to address 172.16.3.1: Operation timed out
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
imac:~ james$
james I’m almost certain you don’t have your IP Address set to the same IP Addresses that I use on my home network. The issue you have is your IP Addresses won’t be 172.16.3. but will be something else. In my tutorial I show you how to get those IP Addresses. Please go back and look at that tutorial once more.
OK, my brain is now switched on now.
I don’t have Ethernet connected. Wi-Fi is connected – ‘Wi-Fi is connected to Turandot and has the IP address 192.168.178.28.’
Have gone through the tutorial again…configured ok…still get 016-781.
Printing is no problem.
@James what is the IP of the Printer and the IP of the Computer you are connected to via wifi?
If the IP Address of your computer is 192.168.178.28 then after you walk through the steps of the computer you should be able to open a connection to 192.168.178.28 139 via telnet.
The IP of my computer is 192.168.178.28…
Printer is 192.168.178.27
get…
imac:~ james$ telnet 192.168.178.28 139
Trying 192.168.178.28…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.178.28: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
in this case you either don’t have smb configured on your computer or you have a firewall turned on that is blocking port 139. Did you follow all the steps in the tutorial above? Specifically Step 4
Yes, followed all, have just double checked… firewall is off…
My setup…
My WLAN router (network ‘Tosca’) is my connection to the outside world…my printer(DELL) is connected to this via cable…
My WLAN router is connected to a TimeCapsule which provides an additional network ‘Turandot’. My Mac is connected wirelessly to Turandot…
Connected mac wirelessly to ‘Tosca’…same result 016-781…
Here is my setup.
My dell 3115 is setup wirelessly… Always has been… I have always connected to it via WiFi (dell device)… Do I need to wire it?
I have tried several ways on the printer panel with the setup.
Wirelessly Get IP via – DHCP, AutoIP, Panel… If I set it up via autoip and then connect it thru WiFi I can print but not scan (but I believe that cause it makes its own IP once it connects through WiFi).
If I set it up any other way I can’t seem to print at all.
I have it setup to get ip via panel and entered my own ip (like in your tut) I can’t seem to even log into the printer threw that IP right now to change the IP in the address book so I can try and scan. (trying to figure out what I did to cause that.)
Maybe some of our problems occur with how we have our setup/settings on our printer panels themselves.
So I got it to print again… And to go to setup wireless settings then change it back to autoip…
then it tells you to restart printer… after restart my printer wireless ip was 0.0.0.0 so then I connected to it via WiFi and printed something… went back and looked in the printer panel at the wireless ip and it was now 169.254.84.69… My network ip on my mac system pref is (via step 1) is 192.168.1.102…
Now that I printed something and have an ip on the printer (169.254.84.69) I can login to the printer (opening browser step) via the 169.254.84.69 ip… so now should I change the ip’s there to the network ip of 192.168.1.102 with the port 139?
@Kory,
nothing wrong with setting it up via wireless. My wife does that. Please note that both interfaces can hold an IP and will keep seperate settings. So it is possible for both the wireless and the wired to have a seperate ip address. You’ll need the network ip of the printer to be 192.168.1.x o that it can be on the same range. But the ip shouldn’t be 102 as that is the ip to your computer. I’d suggest setting it at 192.168.1.10 netmask 255.255.255.0 so that the printer can always be accessed via the same IP Address. From there open your terminal and see if you can “telnet 192.168.1.102 139” which will see if you have the port open for 139 on your mac (which has the address of ….102. Let me know.
Chris
Ok…
So on my printer in the setup->admin menu->wireless->
I have GetIP optinos = AutoIP, BOOP, RARP, DHCP, Panel… I’m assuming Panel? (thats where I put it)
IP address now is = 192.168.1.10
then under the subnet mask it is set to – 255.255.255.0
then I open browser and type in 192.168.1.10… (not working)
At this point I opened terminal and got this.
Last login: Fri Oct 28 09:42:05 on console
iMac:~ user$ telnet 192.168.1.102 139
Trying 192.168.1.102…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.1.102: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
iMac:~ user$
I also just thought of something… my login name “short” is (user) it looks like… I had entered iMac… maybe thats some other peoples problem, the wrong login name “short” (I dunno)
do I still need to connect to the printer via WiFi? Cause I am… (at this point it won’t print… it just says connecting to printer and sits there in the job status window… and then says printer not responding)
I’ll try and reboot whole system… now and see what happens…
if you can’t telnet to the 102 then don’t even worry about your printer. You must first get your computer to accept connection via itself before you worry about other devices connecting to it.
Well I tried all kinds of things… logged into my router and turned off spi firewall saved and went to terminal result:
iMac:~ user$ telnet 192.168.1.102 139
Trying 192.168.1.102…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.1.102: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
I turned off little snitch… result:
iMac:~ user$ telnet 192.168.1.102 139
Trying 192.168.1.102…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.1.102: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
So is there anything I’m missing? I have no other firewall or anything that I’m aware of…
I rechecked my smb and I did exactly as you said in step 4…
I have a linksys e2000 router… I have looked through there for port info but don’t see anything blocking ports… do I forward a port?
I found single port forwarding so in the drop down menu it says (telnet) so when I click that it shows this:
external port = 23 (can’t change this)
internal port = 23 (can’t change this)
protocol = TCP (can’t cahnge this)
to ip address = 192.168.1.0 (I can only change the 0 so I did 102) = 192.168.1.102
results:
iMac:~ user$ telnet 192.168.1.102 139
Trying 192.168.1.102…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.1.102: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
I tried 23 instead of 139 cause it showed obove.
result:
iMac:~ user$ telnet 192.168.1.102 23
Trying 192.168.1.102…
telnet: connect to address 192.168.1.102: Connection refused
telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
I have other options – Port Range Forwarding – Port Range Triggering… I have nothing filled in on either of those.
Is there something in system preferences I’m missing?
I have a time capsule also with airport… something in there jackin with me? when I look at airport utility and manual setup on the time capsule then look at that IP it shows 192.168.1.104..
@Kory it shouldn’t have any issue with it. Would you mind if I remoted your system to take a look?
Chris
Where can I email you?
cpierce at csdurant dot com
Thank you! I have had this printer for years and I’ve never been able to scan with it. IT WORKS!!!! Thanks again.
Chris,
Will you be willing to remote to my computer for a repair? I’m willing to pay a fee for it. I for some reason can’t seem to get the scanning portion to work. Everything else, works great, expect, scanning. Thank you!
Raffi
** Update – the new instructions are easier and work a ton better.
Chris – I can’t begin to thank you enough. I was so disappointed when I upgraded to Lion to find I could no longer scan documents to my Mac from by Dell printer–something I do almost daily. Your instructions were perfect and easy to follow. Thank-you, it works like a champ.
hey,
in my office i’ve got 3 PCs and recently i bought and iMac. I cant use the scanner on my mac even with above setting can u please help me?
Hi Chris – thanks for the pointers. But I have trouble with terminal. Can I select ‘remote login’ under system preferences instead? I have tried it but am having issues. Any pointers gratefully received.
Not sure i’m following. You can’t use terminal?
Chris,
Finally got it working!! Thank you so much!
worked perfectly ! – thanks for blog post….
Hi Chris, returned to this again, your new instructions solved my problem. Good man Chris! Thanks. Feel free to send me your PayPal acc. James
I now have a working Printer AND Scanner! Thank you so much for your tutorial!
Awesome…works perfectly. Any help on getting it to scan to email?
I’ve had pretty good luck with scanning to email with Dell printers but there are so many different factors. I’m using gmail and have had good success. What mail provider are you wanting to use?
Hi Chris, I’ve looked at your various posts but can’t sort my problem which is that I can’t scan to my computer since upgrading to Lion. Your driver upgrade downloads but gets stuck when installing and I don’t understand your step 2 above. What does “open terminal” mean please? and where do I go from here. Thanks.
Terminal is a command prompt style application for Mac OS X. The Terminal can be opened by looking in Applications->Utilities and running Terminal.App.
Let me know if you need anything else. Thanks,
Chris
Sorry, Found Terminal and typed “sudo…..plist” closed, created scans folder in Documents, typed “ftp” in terminal and now have ftp> and am now stuck. Type in log in user name and password after ftp> ? with space or how? Thanks.
Chris, Thank you for this help in connecting the dell 3115cn scanner to my MAC. Followed your directions; works great on my Lion. Tried the same procedure on my partners’ Snow Leopard. I get a “not connected” message in Terminal, when using the cd Documents/Scans. Is there something else that I should do? Thank you for your coaching.
Thanks for the post. It worked perfectly on Mac Pro now upgraded to Mountain Lion. Also your driver for the 3115 is working beautifully as well. Thanks for the hard work. Jim
Hat off to you Chris!
Perfect post, everything works fine now with my Dell 3115CN and 10.8.
Thank you very much!
Thanks for this and the driver – absolute life saver. Just wanted to add that I had to go through an extra couple of loops:
1. Password protect the Scans folder (by turning it into an encrypted disc image – google “password protect mac folder”), and
2. In printer web setup go to
Printer Settings
Select the Printer Settings tab
Select the Scan Defaults button
Change Send to Client from Computer to Server
I couldn’t work out why the printer never showed my Mac, but as soon as I did this it appeared on the menu and your settings worked like a charm.
Got this to work and also by changing “Change Send to Client from Computer to Server” as mentioned in the comments by Ashley Horobin
Hi,
I could not get this to work, I am sure it is something I am doing wrong
I have set up the Address book as described, in fact I have a number of entries as I am trying all sorts of options, the Dell printer sees all my option and I can select any of them, they all give me the same error.
Log-in Error
016-782
Followed the details letter by letter, tried a bunch of different user names, still the same issue.
The only thing that I have different is the sudo command, when I run this in the terminal it asks for a password, I have no passwords setup.
Any clues.
Mike
I’m running maverick 10.9.2
if you are having trouble with STEP 2.
sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/ftp.plist
*terminal says invalid.
I found that you can use, FTPD-enable app
http://www.troncept.com/lion-ftpd-enable/
FREE
Hi Chris. Thx for posting this. Since I have OSX Yosemite 10.10.1, if I follow the same steps above, should all work with the same Dell machine? 🙂
Chris
You are awesome my friend.
Thank you so much!!
Hello Chris, I’ve had this working in the past but not for the past year, and I don’t know why. I’ve done all the above but am unsure of Step 3. “Testing” Don’t know how to do that. And the “short” user name? Mine, I thought was michaelstevens, Does that make sense? The error I keep getting is “016-781”
Any further help would be appreciated. Thanks.
p.s. I changed my ISP a year ago to BT (UK) Could it be something to do with the firewall?
Thank you! I followed your instructions above and hey presto! suddenly the scan to my MacBook Pro just…works! I’m so glad! BTW, my OS is Yosemite 10.10.4., and I didn’t have to change anything from the above, even though my Telnet said connection refused and so on. Does anyone know how to configure the file name of the scan pdf, or are we stuck with img-123456789.pdf? Thanks again Chris, I’m very grateful.
Thank you this worked for me. I was getting ‘Not Connected’ at stage two when typing FTP> cd Documents/Scans but it didn’t affect the scans from arriving to my iMac. I am also on Sierra.
Only question I have is, is opening FTP secure?
Could you please also do a tutorial on scan to email? Would greatly appreciate it!