Thanks for looking at my post!

We have been trying to consolidate. We have a small house and too much stuff. We just got an inexpensive laptop for my girl to replace the corpulent, ancient Dell that’s been gathering dust on her desk for a couple years now. We got rid of the peripherals also.

So now, in the “office” upstairs we have my desktop, her laptop and a printer/scanner/copier. Downstairs, in the living/dining room is my laptop. It’s not a big deal to network the computers and share the printer. If we wanted to print something from the laptop downstairs, I’d have to turn on the desktop upstairs. So I picked up and inexpensive print server. I’m having problems getting it to work right.

I got a TrendNet TE100-P1U. After a lot of time, effort and lost patience, I was able to print with the desktop, through the server. Now the problem is getting the laptops to print though the server.

I can get to the web based server interface on both laptops and the server recognizes the printer. I try to do what the instructions say and I can’t get it to work. I’m told to go to add a printer-click “a network printer”-click “this printer” but when I put in the server name and printer name is says to check the spelling or that the printer isn’t available. In the server interface I renamed the server “printer”. I’m not totally sure where the name of the printer is. Did I come up with this name? I did come up with a share name, that shows up on the desktop. The share name I choose is printer00. So in the add a printer I type \\printer\printer00. I can’t get it to work.

Should all computers have to go through the TCP/IP printing set up? Do I have to install the printer, without the server, on all the computers?

Can anyone help?

Thanks!

 

In the add printer wizard, leave the printer name blank and click next. Then you can browse to the printer, click on it and add it.

If it don't work delete printer and do it again.

 

When I do that the box that says printer is blank.

In the box that says shared printers, where I am supposed to choose a printer from, it says: Microsoft Windows Network on the first line and MSHOME on the second. Neither one of these is a usable option.

What do I have to do to get the printer to show up in the box that I'm supposed to be choosing a printer from?

 

MSHOME is Microsoft XP's default workgroup name. That is the name of your networks workgroup. The group of computers that are allowed to talk to each other with in a LAN/WAN network.

Click on the plus sign next to MSHOME "or double click MSHOME" and it will expand to show all usable printers and thier locations that are in that Workgroup.


ETA
Actually you may have to expand one more inside MSHOME, likely have to expand the "TrendNet TE100-P1U" the printer will be in there.....

 

I just read the quick install. The following is the EASIEST way to install it on ALL computers, that install guide is totally out to lunch. Proper networking and workgroups is not required - only basic TCP/IP connectivity.

1. Part of the setup involves assigning the device a proper IP address to be used on your network. NOTE this address! Ping it from each computer before adding the printer - open a command prompt and type: ping xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx (where the X's represent the IP address) and verify 100% returns.

2. On each computer, use the add printer wizard, but do NOT choose network printer - choose LOCAL printer.

3. Then you have to Add New Port.

4. Choose standard TCP/IP port, and use the IP address of the print server.

5. If your printer is not in the pick list, use Have Disk and point it to the appropriate driver folder on your printer's CD.

 

That will work with static IP, but most home routers are DHCP servers (more user friendly, less problems for the less experienced home users, means less calls to tech center plus is cheaper software development.) So being DHCP, the IP is Dynamic. The printer servers IP may change at any given time, the print servers current IP could be given to any of the other devices or computers either when the lease is up "24 hours, if lease time is set at (0)", or depending on the order the systems are booted in during a power cycle.

It may keep that IP "by chance" 100 times then on reboot, or lease is up that 101th time..... no more printer.
If your sending to an IP, and suddenly a computer now has that IP, then you just sent a print job to another computer. Network congestion at it's finest, network just crashed.

Always always always use device name on DHCP server.

 

I followed the quick install instructions, over and over and it wouldn't work. I got it to work on the desktop by alterint the procedure.

How do I confirm the printer name?

 

What do you mean confirm the printer name?
I've never been asked to confirm, it either finds it or it doesn't.

 

Is the printer name the share name that I gave it? Is the printer name the model?

If it's the frist then I should be inputting: \\printer\printer00

If it's the second I should be inputting: \\printer\hp psc 1200 series

It's actually a 1210.

I've named the Trendnet printer server "printer". That much I do know.

Maybe I do have to do the TCP/IP set up on all computers?

 

It does not matter whether you have a static or dynamic IP. The quick install tells you how to set a static IP on the print server, which is what you need. It needs to be in the same subnet as your router and outside its DHCP range.

wittom, FORGET all that crap and follow my instructions. You do not need a printer name, you do not need sharing, or ANY of that crap. Use simple direct TCP/IP printing on ALL computers. You are making it a lot more difficult than it needs to be.

 

Thanks for the help. I just got all three computers to print to the printer though the server. I'm happy now.

I ended up having to install the printer on all of the computers. If I didn't do this I wasn't able to load the proper drivers.

I tried to follow advise but I ended up doing a variation. I would not have been able to do it at all with out a little direction, so thanks!