Can’t do “network” printing anymore. Help.

[Pablo]

You guys are “da bomb” on PC problems. I now have a new issue. Two PC’s One PC is XP, the other Win 2000. – hooked to the cable internet via a wired router. Internet access is great on both.

I can see the shared files on both. I have shared files and printers turned on, on both PC’s

I want to print on the new printer on the XP PC. But I can’t. I used to be able to, prior to complete OS re-install for the XP PC, but now on the Win2000 PC I cannot install the network printer – it doesn’t find it (again I can share files). I click on install new printer on the old win 2000 PC and it simply can’t find the printer.

As I stated – it frustrating because network printing worked before. Am I missing the obvious?

Anyone have a clue?

 

[handyman]

Pablo

Firewall settings??
Check out your firewall settings. You may have one firewall set up where it would not recognize the other computer and therefore it would not recognize the printer.

I've had good luck with a program call "Network Magic". It has a great graphical interface that’s much better than the regular Microsoft network stuff. It’s built for home networks and has a free trial period. It’s much better setting up file and printer sharing using it.

It will show/help you with your home network and any problems you might have.


www.networkmagic.com

 

[handyman]

Pablo

I’ve worked one friend’s home network where she could not print to her printer using her laptop. It was one of these all in one printer/scanner/fax. It was hooked up to her desktop with a USB cord.

She has three computers. A laptop, a desktop and a Mac.

She had another inkjet printer hook up to her Mac.

I could not spend a lot of time working on it so I ran a printer cable to the inkjet printer and hook it up to her desktop.

She now has the old printer USB cord to the Mac and a regular printer cable to her pc. It’s was a quick way to share a printer with two computers.

She’s now able to print to the inkjet printer by using her laptop.

My point is that some of these new combo printers/scanner/faxes/copiers are hard to configure.

 

[JustinH]

Unless you are running a print server (which you probably aren't).

Then you have a printer hooked directly to a host pc with a usb cable.

This is common.

The host pc needs to be turned on for it to host the printer for other users.

It also needs to be shared across the network for others to be able to see it. Right click, then share it.

Add the printer from other pc's by using the add from network routine, and it will add the printer.

 

[Pablo]

That network magic is pretty cool - even though I had turned my firewall off - it told me I still had a firewall up.

Fixed. Too many layers of protection was the problem. Cool!

Thanks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Pablo]

IOW - I would have been better off leaving my firewall ON (with cable modem off) and seeing what was bouncing against it - then just allowing it. Which is exactly what I did after prompting from networkmagic. There are some cool features about this program, too. I have dramatically sped up my LAN as well. Sweet. Thanks again handyman.

Paul

 

[handyman]

Pable
You're welcome
Network magic has saved my bacon several times over.