# which is better approach - "sharing" printer or using small print server?



## Hansen (Jan 1, 2006)

I have a printer I want to be able to print on from any of the computers in my home. Is it better to enable print sharing on all computers and use the computer the printer is hooked up to as the server for print jobs, or is it better to go out and buy a small inexpensive print server and use that to make it a networked printer? Print sharing would be the most inexpensive since no need to buy a print server but I recognize I have to leave that computer on in order to print to printer from remote locations in home. The problem is that when I tried to set up print sharing I ran into some weird driver errors. I suspect it might be because the printer is hooked up to a machine running Vista 64 bit and the laptop is running XP (32 bit) but don't really know if that is what is causing errors.


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## Stuart Sweet (Jun 19, 2006)

I have done both, and tried it with a mixed Vista/XP environment and I found that the best thing to do was network the printer. I was trying to use the XP computer as a print server and the Vista computer just didn't quite get it. I understand you've got it going the other way but I still suspect that you'll be happier with a networked printer.


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## Hansen (Jan 1, 2006)

Stuart Sweet said:


> I have done both, and tried it with a mixed Vista/XP environment and I found that the best thing to do was network the printer. I was trying to use the XP computer as a print server and the Vista computer just didn't quite get it. I understand you've got it going the other way but I still suspect that you'll be happier with a networked printer.


Thanks. Any suggestions for a good but not too costly print server?

Edit: Found this one at Fry's for $39. Anyone know anything about it? http://www.airlink101.com/products/amps230.php


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## Stuart Sweet (Jun 19, 2006)

That's a decent one, a little delicate but the price is about 1/2 what you'd pay for something else. Just be careful at Fry's, they sometimes repackage their returns without calling them returns or open box.


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## Doug Brott (Jul 12, 2006)

Be careful with print servers as some of them don't have enough memory on board. What that means is that the awesome picture you want to print won't always work.

I went a more expensive route, but I've been very happy with the choice I made. I picked up a Brother MFC-9440CN that does exactly what I need it to do. It's a color laser, includes a fax machine, network printing and network scanning. I'd actually prefer it to be even more functional than it is, but it's already jacked on the price, so that's that .

If you leave your "printer attached" computer on all of the time, then there really is no big problem having that as your print server. But either option is a good choice and really is dependent on your needs.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

I have my HP printers on my Vista PC and use printer sharing from there - works great, and zero extra cost.


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## Stuart Sweet (Jun 19, 2006)

It's true, the latest photosmart printers from HP have the same Jetdirect hardware that used to cost $400.


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## Hansen (Jan 1, 2006)

Doug Brott said:


> Be careful with print servers as some of them don't have enough memory on board. What that means is that the awesome picture you want to print won't always work.
> 
> I went a more expensive route, but I've been very happy with the choice I made. I picked up a Brother MFC-9440CN that does exactly what I need it to do. It's a color laser, includes a fax machine, network printing and network scanning. I'd actually prefer it to be even more functional than it is, but it's already jacked on the price, so that's that .
> 
> If you leave your "printer attached" computer on all of the time, then there really is no big problem having that as your print server. But either option is a good choice and really is dependent on your needs.


The printer I'm planning on attaching is a 3 or 4 year old Brother HL5140 laser printer (black and white only). Will this be an issue for the memory of the print server? (Looks like from the specs the little print server has 2 mb of flash memory but also says "system memory 8 mb SDRAM" ?????).


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## Steve Mehs (Mar 21, 2002)

I say get a network printer and be done with it. I used to use a Motorola Print Server and then a Linksys Print Server in conjunction with my higher end (at the time) Lexmark, it worked beautifully with Windows 2000, but on XP, I'd get a whole slew of errors when attemping to print, I'd hit Ok for them all and then it would print. Go figure. Then 2 years ago I got an HP Wireless G Printer and never looked back. Takes 5 minutes to install and configure.


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## naijai (Aug 19, 2006)

I have an XP pc and Multiple Vista Pc's with my printer on the XP machine and all my computers print with no problem just make sure the drivers for the printer are installed properly on each machine before connecting to each one on your network or you can still opt for the print server


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## CJTE (Sep 18, 2007)

Hansen said:


> I have a printer I want to be able to print on from any of the computers in my home. Is it better to enable print sharing on all computers and use the computer the printer is hooked up to as the server for print jobs, or is it better to go out and buy a small inexpensive print server and use that to make it a networked printer?


That really depends on your situation. I have a couple different scenarios running:
In my office, I have a Windows XP Pro desktop that shares my Lexmark 3400, Brother HL-1440, and HP OfficeJet 5600. That computer is almost never shut off, aside when taken down for maintenance/cleaning. It serves printers through a guest account to 4 of my laptops. Every once in a while I have to refresh the authentication between the laptop(s) and the desktop (by re-logging on to the share from the laptop), but otherwise it works wonderfully.
I also have a Belkin single-print server, for 1 USB printer. I had some issues because you have to use their management tool, and they dont tell you that the DHCP server is enabled by default, so you could have some real networking problems if your machine picks up an address from the print server instead of your router, but once all the bugs are worked out, it works "ok."
I also have an HP Deskjet all-in-one 7300, which is a network printer. So long as you keep the web-based management locked down so no-one messes with it, its pretty solid.



Hansen said:


> Print sharing would be the most inexpensive since no need to buy a print server but I recognize I have to leave that computer on in order to print to printer from remote locations in home. The problem is that when I tried to set up print sharing I ran into some weird driver errors. I suspect it might be because the printer is hooked up to a machine running Vista 64 bit and the laptop is running XP (32 bit) but don't really know if that is what is causing errors.


Bingo. Your vista machine is most-likely trying to pass down vista drivers. You can usually change what drivers are shared in the properties of the printer, and you can add XP/98SE drivers. You could also manually install the print driver on the local machine.
If you get an error about the driver not being signed, hit 'Continue Anyway'. I've yet to run into a network print driver that *IS* signed by microsoft.


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## Drew2k (Aug 16, 2006)

My HP is on the Vista-32, and my XP laptop can print to it with no issues. Of course, before I had set up printer sharing on the Vista, I had installed the printer as local on the laptop, so the drivers were already in place on the laptop by the time I set up print sharing on the Vista, and no attempts were made to send Vista drivers down to the HP.

For a zero cost solution, simply installing the printer software on each eventual client is not too bad. The only drawback, as mentioned, is the print server PC always needs to be available ...


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## Chop69 (Aug 11, 2007)

Sooner or later, I have always had problems with print servers that are setup by creating a local TCP/IP port.

A higher end printer/print server that shows up like a computer when browsing a network are usually more trouble free. Connecting to a PC and sharing is the cheapest, easiest, most reliable way. 

At the moment the only shared printer I have on my network is connected to a Windows Home Server that stays on all the time


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## Steve Mehs (Mar 21, 2002)

I forgot to mention, if you get a print server or networked printer, set up it up with a static IP that you assign, rather then one from your routers DHCP. This way you'll always know the IP to check the config page if needed.


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## Doug Brott (Jul 12, 2006)

Steve Mehs said:


> I forgot to mention, if you get a print server or networked printer, set up it up with a static IP that you assign, rather then one from your routers DHCP. This way you'll always know the IP to check the config page if needed.


True, but my method for doing this is a reserved DHCP address. I just find it easier to maintain .. but, that will not be true for everyone.


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## Hansen (Jan 1, 2006)

Thanks guys for all the help and suggestions. Couldn't get sharing to work properly so went with print server option. Fry's had a sale today on an Airlink wireless print server for $19.99 (normally $69.99) which seems like a real good deal. You can also run it in hardwire mode if you do not want to do wireless and gives me the future ability to do wireless with it if move printer to remote location. Hooked it up and seems to work well so far. I did notice it runs in the background and is in system tray on each computer. Does something like this consume much in term of resources by running in background?


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## Mark Holtz (Mar 23, 2002)

A few years ago, I added a 10 Mbps network card to my HP Laserjet 4 printer so that my mother and I can use my printer. I simply put a fixed IP address on the printer, then created a TCP/IP to that printer. Works great from all of my computers.


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