Printer sharing

[Paul Starr]

Desktop computer "A" is running Windows XP and is connected via USB cable to HP6800 printer. The printer is shared and can be used by second desktop "B" running Vista. An HP Laptop running Vista and connecting via WiFi cannot connect to computer "A" and cannot use the shared printer. I have tried everything but to no avail. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Pieter 't Hart]

It may be that pc-B allocates the printershare for single use, so disconnect the share from the vista-pc and test again.

as you mention "connecting via WiFi"
I assume you got a network with a wireless router.
How is pc-A connected to this? , does the router has built-in switchports?

If you got a wifi-router with an uplink to the internet. It may only be configured for communication from lan to internet and from wifi to internet, if so go into the router config and enable this.

You can do some basic tests first at TCP/IP connectivity.
use "ipconfig" or "ipconfig /all" on all hosts to query the ip-adresses used.
Temporarily switch of the windows-firewall (don't forget to enable after tests.

do a ping from laptop to pc-A.
If they are in the same range (subnet), ping must give response. If not the wifi-router does not pass the info correctly.
If these are slightly different ranges (two subnets) then also the "default-gateway" at both ends need to be correct (pointing to the routers adress within the connected subnets.
if this succeeds you have basic network conenctivity and the problem lies on a higer level.

check if both pc and laptop have the same "workgroup" set (communication between two workgroups is more complex).

from the laptops command prompt try "net view \\"
if this works you can connect the printershare using the ip-adress.
Then the problem lies in whats called a "master browser" wich task will be performed by the vista machine.
For this your laptop also needs to communicate with the vista machine.
Also (temporarily) disable windows-firewall at the vista machine.
and test again.

[Dennis Handly]

Can B see A? Have you enabled printer and file sharing on A? Can you see any files on A?

I have set this up once and had a bunch of problems. Pieter mentioned they have to be in the same workgroup and you need to make sure the firewall doesn't prevent it. And if using something like Norton, make sure it allows other computers on the home networks to access.

The next problem was getting permissions to copy the drivers from A to B.

See this thread:
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=1249061

After I got all that working, my brother-in-law got a new Norton and I wasn't able to make it work again. :-(

[Paul Starr]

Thanks for the tips. I will follow all the steps in your replies this weekend and let you know what happens on Monday.
Regards.