Lsrjt 1300 printouts going to the wrong printer on network

[pop42]

I have just started to help out on a peer to peer networking system. In one department, there are 5 PC's, 4 running win 2000 Pro and the 5th XP Home. There are three HP laserjet 1300 printers. Printer A is for reports from all 5 computers, printer B is for contracts from computers 1, 2, & 3, and Printer C is for contracts from computers 4 & 5. There are times when their software closes and it must be reopened. The company says it's not the software but a problem with the network.

At times, the computers print to the wrong printer. This seems to happen when the software logs the user out.

We have unique static IP's on each computer and they can all talk to each other fine and most of the time everything works ok. The defaults in windows are set properly.

Each computer and printer has their own name.
Could this be a network problem as suggested by the software vendor?

Thanks, in advance, for any help.

[Jon Finley]

That would depend on how your printers are set up, and how the computers attach to them.

If you are using static IP's on BOTH your computers AND your printers, AND you create an IP port locally on each computer to print directly to the printer, then the problem may be software related.

If you are using DHCP for the printers AND/OR are using the WINS names to print to, then it can be network related and/or a problem with the WINS server.

Jon

[kcpant]

Hi friend,

as finley said, it depends on how printers installed. If you have connected printers through LPT or USB ports, it is possible that because of some network problem, your computers which are connected to printers through sharing, may not find it when you login, and that's why your job is fired to another printer.

If you have connected printers to network through a print server or jetdirect cards, there might be a problem of IP related, as said by finley. If you are using DHCP for printers and defined names for the printers through WINS server, everytime your printer powered up may be getting a different IP and your WINS server may not properly mapping the name with new IP. try to using your printers by IPs, not by names in this condition.