Brother HL-4150CDN Driver

Open-source CUPS driver for the Brother HL-4150CDN color laser printer. Written in Python with optional Cython acceleration, runs anywhere CUPS does — including ARM (Raspberry Pi).

Status

Drop-in for the printer's Normal mode (600 dpi). Output matches the manufacturer's CUPS filter byte for byte for every colour, tray and media setting (colour matching Normal/Vivid/None, improve gray, enhance black, toner save, glossy, brightness/contrast/saturation/RGB keys), for grayscale, and for simplex, long-edge and short-edge duplex. Paper sizes other than A4 are checked byte for byte on Letter, A5, DL, 3x5 and Envelope #4; for all 21 sizes the page header values match the original. Correctness is established by byte-level comparison against captures from the manufacturer's filter.

Fine mode (1200 dpi) emits valid framing; the compressed band data is not yet byte-identical.

On a Raspberry Pi 3B+ with the Cython modules and the precomputed inverse LUTs, a 131-page job goes through the CUPS filter in about 133 s (roughly 1 s per page) with a peak memory use of about 64 MB.

Requirements

• Python 3.13+ and uv
• Ghostscript (the CUPS pipeline rasterizes PostScript to PPM)
• CUPS
• Optional, for speed: a C compiler and the Python headers (Debian: sudo apt install build-essential python3-dev). install.sh then builds the Cython modules (RLE encoders, colour lookup, dither and a band renderer that uses several cores); without them the driver falls back to pure Python, which is several times slower.
• About 130 MB of disk space for the precomputed inverse colour LUTs (Normal and Vivid, 64 MiB each). install.sh computes them, which takes about two minutes on a Pi 3.
• A copy of the official Brother HL-4150CDN LPR driver .deb (scripts/extract_blobs.sh downloads and verifies it; the printer's calibration tables are extracted into src/lut/ and src/color_data/ and are not redistributed)

Install

git clone https://github.com/cl445/brother-hl4150cdn-driver.git
cd brother-hl4150cdn-driver

uv sync --all-extras
./scripts/extract_blobs.sh
sudo cups/install.sh                                            # filter + PPD
sudo cups/install.sh --add-printer socket://<printer-ip>:9100   # network, optional

Pick the device URI that matches how the printer is attached:

Connection	URI	Discover
Ethernet / Wi-Fi	socket://<printer-ip>:9100	manufacturer's web UI / nmap -p9100
USB	usb://Brother/HL-4150CDN?serial=<serial>	lpinfo --include-schemes usb -l -v

Without --add-printer, register the queue manually:

sudo lpadmin -p Brother_HL-4150CDN -E \
  -v <device-uri> \
  -P /usr/share/cups/model/brhl4150cdn.ppd

sudo cups/uninstall.sh --remove-printer cleans up.

Upgrading

Pull, then re-run ./scripts/extract_blobs.sh and sudo cups/install.sh. Existing queues keep their old copy of the PPD; to pick up new options (e.g. the standard Duplex option since 1.1.0), re-assign it. This resets the queue's default options:

sudo lpadmin -p Brother_HL-4150CDN -P /usr/share/cups/model/brhl4150cdn.ppd

Settings

All options are PPD-driven and surfaced in the standard print dialog. Pass them as -o key=value to lp / lpr for scripting.

Option	Values	Notes
PageSize	A4, Letter, Legal, Executive, A5, PRA5Rotated (A5 long edge), A6, ISOB5, ISOB6, JISB5, JISB6, Postcard, EnvDL, EnvPRC5Rotated (DL long edge), EnvC5, Env10 (Com-10), EnvMonarch, Br3x5, FanFoldGermanLegal (Folio), EnvYou4 (Envelope #4), EnvChou3 (Envelope MAX)
BRMediaType	Plain, Thin, Thick, Thicker, Bond, Envelope, EnvThin, EnvThick, Recycled, Postcard, Label, Glossy	Glossy uses the glossy colour tables
BRResolution	600dpi (Normal), 600x2400dpi (Fine)	Fine mode is incomplete (see Status)
BRMonoColor	Auto, FullColor, Mono
Duplex	None, DuplexNoTumble, DuplexTumble	Tumble = short edge; IPP sides works too
BRColorMatching	Normal, Vivid, None	Each selects its own colour tables
BRGray	OFF, ON	Improve gray: ImpGray colour tables
BREnhanceBlkPrt	OFF, ON	Enhance black: rich black for pure black
BRImproveOutput	OFF, BRLessPaperCurl, BRFixIntensity
BRInputSlot	AutoSelect, Tray1, Tray2, MPTray
BRTonerSaveMode	OFF, ON	Toner-save dither and colour tables
BRSkipBlank	OFF, ON
BRReverse	OFF, ON	Reverse page order
BRBrightness	-20 … 20
BRContrast	-20 … 20
BRSaturation	-20 … 20
BRRed, BRGreen, BRBlue	-20 … 20	Per-channel input shift

Copies come from the standard -n / copies option.

CLI without CUPS

# PPM in, XL2HB raw stream out
cat page.ppm | uv run python src/brfilter.py \
    --paper Letter --duplex long --toner-save \
  > page.xl2hb

# Send straight to the printer (network)
cat page.ppm | uv run python src/brfilter.py | nc <printer-ip> 9100

# …or via USB
cat page.ppm | uv run python src/brfilter.py > /dev/usb/lp0

Development

uv sync --all-extras
uv run nox --list

# common sessions
uv run nox -s lint            # ruff
uv run nox -s format_check    # ruff format --check
uv run nox -s typecheck       # pyrefly
uv run nox -s deps            # deptry
uv run nox -s tests           # pytest (1109 tests, needs extracted blobs)

The Cython modules are optional in development too; build them in place with:

uv run --with cython,setuptools python setup_cython.py build_ext --inplace

The test fixtures in tests/fixtures/ are zstd-compressed XL2HB captures from the manufacturer's filter — pytest decompresses them on demand. Adding a new capture-based test is two steps: drop a fresh capture into tests/fixtures/<name>.xl2hb.zst and reference it from a parametrized test (tests/test_full_pipeline.py has the existing pattern).

License

GPL-3.0-or-later. The PPD in cups/ is derived from Brother's GPL-2.0-or-later HL-4150CDN PPD; see the file header for attribution. The Brother calibration tables that extract_blobs.sh pulls in remain under their own licence and never enter this repository.

Trademarks

Brother and HL-4150CDN are trademarks of Brother Industries, Ltd. This project is an independent, community-driven driver and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Brother Industries, Ltd.