Error when default printer is a lan printer and it's not available

[Jorge Pinto Leite]

Hi
I hope someone can help me with this problem.
I have a small lan with 2 PC's, and PC1 has a local connected shared printer.
The PC's OS is XP Home Ed. and they use Office XP.
Whenever the second PC tries to use Winword, if (and only if) the lan is disconnected it reports an error, requesting me to send a report to Microsoft and crashes.
If the lan is connected no problem occurs.
I've already downloaded all updates for Windows as well as for Office.
This problem happens even if I'm just writing something, without trying to print anything.
Thanks in advance.
Jorge

[Jerome Henry]

I'm not sure something can be done, XP family edition is not really made to work on a LAN, and once connected, to work unconnected. It would be fixed with XP pro edition of course, but you have family edition.
Try to add a local fake printer, you would but as default, it sometimes fixes it...
hth
J

[Jorge Pinto Leite]

Hi Jerome, thank you for your answer.
According to Microsoft, Home Ed. can be used over a workgroup, but not over a domain.
I really don't know if same problem happens on a XP Pro environment! I wonder if someone can test it...
I've already surround the problem by adding a inexistent default local printer and instructing it to be used offline.
However I believe this is a bug for XP (Windows and/or Office), and it should be reported to Microsoft. But how?

[Jerome Henry]

Hi Jorge,
In fact this ability within workgroups and unability to log in a domain was anounced after bugs@microsoft.com was flooded with reports of probs of XP home on LAN, but if you read newsgroups about this, the problem continues, even on workgroups.
To report a bug, here is what you are supposed to do, and what you may expect :
http://www.oreillynet.com/cs/user/view/wlg/1502
Good luck !
J
Glad it works now !

[Massimo Bianchi]

Hi,
i had similar problems with the my lan printers.

I found this solution: there is a feature to disable the check of the presenze of the printer.

It's in the properties of the printer. If you disable the polling, you should go well.


HTH,
Massimo