[littlekitty1985]

router? ? I have a Ricoh Afficio in this office (work study, I'm a student and the admin assistant uses me for tech projects haha) and I was walked through by tech support to hook the main computer to it, but the other computers are not responding to the same process. I went through and set up a TCP/IP port under the printer in the control panel as we did with the original but they are not actually printing (as with the first, the problem is that they recognize the printer is online but are not realizing that they aren't printing before deleting the queue and one is saying that we are out of paper...which we aren't).

Suggestions?

Thank you!

[GTB]

I presume you have a network printer that plugs directly into your LAN via a wired cat5 cable.

It must have a static LAN IP address. If you have a dynamic LAN IP address you must change it to a static LAN IP address that is not in the DHCP range as defined in your router. You can log onto the printer using Internet Explorer and entering the printer IP address, then user name, then password (if printer requires user name and password) and check the configuration to see if it is static or dynamic.

Now if you change the IP address of the printer to make it static, you will have to go to the main computer, printers and faxes, and right click on this printer, then click on ports tab and change IP address there to the new one.

Once you have a static IP address, you go to each pc, open printers and faxes, select add a new printer, select local printer, select add a new port, select TCP / IP port, enter the static printer IP address, and complete the set up (which may require the printer driver from printer disc) and you are done. Repeat this on each printer.

[colanth]

On the main computer, share the printer. (Control Panel/Printers/right-click on that printer/Properties/Sharing) Make sure that the network adapter has File and Printer Sharing enabled. (They both have to be correct.)

On the other printers, add a new printer. A network printer. Browse for that printer. Add it. Let the computer install the driver. You'll have to do this on each computer, other than the one the printer is plugged into, (It'll go a lot smoother if the printer is plugged into an XP computer, if you have one.)

After you share the printer on the main computer, it may take as much as half an hour to show up on the other computers. It depends on your network. (It sounds as if the other computers don't have the correct printer [make and model] installed, or it's not installed properly [wrong driver].)