Vista Shared Printer Problem

Hi, need some help.

I have an HP DJ 970cse printer connected to a parallel port on my
desktop which is running Windows XP Home.

I just got a new HP Laptop and have installed my network - I use a
Belkin wireless N router and ZA firewall. The network is fine, I see
both computers and can transfer files between a shared folder on each
machine.

Today, I decided to add a printer to my Laptop. The normal HP driver is
not available for the DJ970 cse, the HP site says it is built in to
Vista and it seems to be fine. I installed the printer using the Add
Printer function and Vista had a driver for the DJ970 connected to the
USB port in this case. I printed a test page and it was fine.

I went back to the printers and clicked on add a printer and this time
chose network printer. The system displayed the shared DJ 970 and Vista
says it was added successfully. To test it you can click on a test page.

When I do this, nothing happens. I opened the printer properties window
and I could see that when I hit the test page, the documents shows (1)
for a second then changes back to zero - that means nothing is in the
queue, I guess.

My old Laptop used WinXP and the shared printer process was about the
same and the shared printer worked fine.

The difference here is that the LT is now Vista and the DJ970 driver is
a Vista driver and of course it does NOT print at all from the network.
The driver works fine as a local printer.

Can anyone assist?

Thanks, Fred

Firstly, install the printer as a local/LPT1 device. Then change the Port
setting to be "\\computername\printershare"

This will cause the printer to use the driver appropriate to the local OS
instead of trying to access the other computer's printer-driver.

"Fred S *****" <"Fred S" wrote:

> Hi, need some help.
>
> I have an HP DJ 970cse printer connected to a parallel port on my
> desktop which is running Windows XP Home.
>
> I just got a new HP Laptop and have installed my network - I use a
> Belkin wireless N router and ZA firewall. The network is fine, I see
> both computers and can transfer files between a shared folder on each
> machine.
>
> Today, I decided to add a printer to my Laptop. The normal HP driver is
> not available for the DJ970 cse, the HP site says it is built in to
> Vista and it seems to be fine. I installed the printer using the Add
> Printer function and Vista had a driver for the DJ970 connected to the
> USB port in this case. I printed a test page and it was fine.
>
> I went back to the printers and clicked on add a printer and this time
> chose network printer. The system displayed the shared DJ 970 and Vista
> says it was added successfully. To test it you can click on a test page.
>
> When I do this, nothing happens. I opened the printer properties window
> and I could see that when I hit the test page, the documents shows (1)
> for a second then changes back to zero - that means nothing is in the
> queue, I guess.
>
> My old Laptop used WinXP and the shared printer process was about the
> same and the shared printer worked fine.
>
> The difference here is that the LT is now Vista and the DJ970 driver is
> a Vista driver and of course it does NOT print at all from the network.
> The driver works fine as a local printer.
>
> Can anyone assist?
>
> Thanks, Fred
>

Anteaus,

Thanks for your comments.

I contacted HP Tech support and they were very helpful and provided me
with the same info except they had me install a software plugin called
"WGAPluginInstall.exe" which installs a patch called an "LLTD" from
Microsoft for Windows XP.

Apparently, that plugin helps make the Shared connection visible and
possible over the network between Vista and XP.

The Vista printer is added as a local port with the name of the port
just as you described.

It works fine now and thanks for your comments as I was just going to
post a followup here about the results.

Fred

Anteaus wrote:
> Firstly, install the printer as a local/LPT1 device. Then change the Port
> setting to be "\\computername\printershare"
>
> This will cause the printer to use the driver appropriate to the local OS
> instead of trying to access the other computer's printer-driver.
>
> "Fred S *****" <"Fred S" wrote:
>
>> Hi, need some help.
>>
>> I have an HP DJ 970cse printer connected to a parallel port on my
>> desktop which is running Windows XP Home.
>>
>> I just got a new HP Laptop and have installed my network - I use a
>> Belkin wireless N router and ZA firewall. The network is fine, I see
>> both computers and can transfer files between a shared folder on each
>> machine.
>>
>> Today, I decided to add a printer to my Laptop. The normal HP driver is
>> not available for the DJ970 cse, the HP site says it is built in to
>> Vista and it seems to be fine. I installed the printer using the Add
>> Printer function and Vista had a driver for the DJ970 connected to the
>> USB port in this case. I printed a test page and it was fine.
>>
>> I went back to the printers and clicked on add a printer and this time
>> chose network printer. The system displayed the shared DJ 970 and Vista
>> says it was added successfully. To test it you can click on a test page.
>>
>> When I do this, nothing happens. I opened the printer properties window
>> and I could see that when I hit the test page, the documents shows (1)
>> for a second then changes back to zero - that means nothing is in the
>> queue, I guess.
>>
>> My old Laptop used WinXP and the shared printer process was about the
>> same and the shared printer worked fine.
>>
>> The difference here is that the LT is now Vista and the DJ970 driver is
>> a Vista driver and of course it does NOT print at all from the network.
>> The driver works fine as a local printer.
>>
>> Can anyone assist?
>>
>> Thanks, Fred
>>