Now that I've got this new laptop that I can connect wirelessly to my
Linksys access point firewall router I would like to be able to print on
the laser printer that is attached to the parallel port of my old
desktop PC running XP Home. The desktop is attached to the router with
ethernet cable.

For the life of me I can't figure out how to make that printer
accessible to my laptop even though I had no such problems last year
with my employer's Dell Latitude D610 that was running XP Pro. Is there
something different with Vista laptops that make it difficult? Or
perhaps the software AVG firewall I am running now on my old desktop
does something different that the previous Trend Micro firewall? The
laptop is running Norton's security suite. My prior, corporate laptop
was running McAfee. I just can't figure out what settings I need to look
at to enable this remote printing. I don't think AVG is at fault as I
tried the connection with AVG disabled to no avail.

Any tips would be appreciated.

Rudy

"R. P." <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:rZ6dnYvpKZN9SzbanZ2dnUVZ_tGonZ2d@comcast.com. ..
First you have enable printer and file sharing on the desktop computer.
This can be done from the Network Setup Wizard which will also make a handy
disc to set up every other PC on your network.

Note the name of the desktop's printer and the desktop PC itself.

Now go to your laptop and go into control panel and then printers and go
into the 'Add a printer'.

Select the option to add a networked printer and specify the printer as.

\\{PC Name}\{printer name}

(my news reader has turned it into a link - it isn't)

Your laptop should find the printer and may ask for a driver disc (though it
may download the drivers automatically from the desktop).

The most frequent cause of failure of this last step is that access to the
desktop (on the laptop) or access from the laptop (on the desktop) is
blocked by one or more firewalls. For this you will need to look at the
firewall's book of instructions as I am not familiar with (nor would I ever
use) Norton's products.

HTH.

"R. P." <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:rZ6dnYvpKZN9SzbanZ2dnUVZ_tGonZ2d@comcast.com. ..
First you have enable printer and file sharing on the desktop computer.
This can be done from the Network Setup Wizard which will also make a handy
disc to set up every other PC on your network.

Note the name of the desktop's printer and the desktop PC itself.

Now go to your laptop and go into control panel and then printers and go
into the 'Add a printer'.

Select the option to add a networked printer and specify the printer as.

\\{PC Name}\{printer name}

(my news reader has turned it into a link - it isn't)

Your laptop should find the printer and may ask for a driver disc (though it
may download the drivers automatically from the desktop).

The most frequent cause of failure of this last step is that access to the
desktop (on the laptop) or access from the laptop (on the desktop) is
blocked by one or more firewalls. For this you will need to look at the
firewall's book of instructions as I am not familiar with (nor would I ever
use) Norton's products.

HTH.

I believe the printer has to be Vista compatible. If it isn't, won't work.
"R. P." <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:rZ6dnYvpKZN9SzbanZ2dnUVZ_tGonZ2d@comcast.com. ..

I believe the printer has to be Vista compatible. If it isn't, won't work.
"R. P." <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:rZ6dnYvpKZN9SzbanZ2dnUVZ_tGonZ2d@comcast.com. ..

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
R. P. <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote:

How far have you got? Tell us what you've done so far, and which bit doesn't
work.

[If you've done it before, I'm assuming that you're familiar with the need
to 'share' the printer on the desktop, and then to install a network
printer - pointing to the shared device - on the laptop]

Can the desktop and laptop see each other's files ok? You need to sort out
any firewall issues which may prevent that from happening before you've got
any chance of making a shared printer work.
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
R. P. <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote:

How far have you got? Tell us what you've done so far, and which bit doesn't
work.

[If you've done it before, I'm assuming that you're familiar with the need
to 'share' the printer on the desktop, and then to install a network
printer - pointing to the shared device - on the laptop]

Can the desktop and laptop see each other's files ok? You need to sort out
any firewall issues which may prevent that from happening before you've got
any chance of making a shared printer work.
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote:
Indeed.

That was the problem: the laptop could not even see my desktop PC.
Finally, after more fiddling with the laptop PC's settings -- and I
don't even remember now what it was that did the trick --
the desktop PC did appear in the Network view of my laptop and I could
also se the printer under the desktop PC and was able to add it to my
laptop's printer list, after it's driver was also installed there.

After all this, I must admit that doing this with my previous corporate
XP Pro laptop was a lot easier and the communication between the two
computers noticeably faster, too.

Now, if I could just make my bluetooth mouse automatically recognized
after booting up, just like my laptop can connect to my router
automatically, then I would be even happier. There must be a way to make
the mouse automatically sync up with the laptop's bluetooth instead of
me having to manually tell the laptop to add the mouse after every cold
boot. Interestingly though, the mouse stays sync'd up across reboots.

Rudy

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote:
Indeed.

That was the problem: the laptop could not even see my desktop PC.
Finally, after more fiddling with the laptop PC's settings -- and I
don't even remember now what it was that did the trick --
the desktop PC did appear in the Network view of my laptop and I could
also se the printer under the desktop PC and was able to add it to my
laptop's printer list, after it's driver was also installed there.

After all this, I must admit that doing this with my previous corporate
XP Pro laptop was a lot easier and the communication between the two
computers noticeably faster, too.

Now, if I could just make my bluetooth mouse automatically recognized
after booting up, just like my laptop can connect to my router
automatically, then I would be even happier. There must be a way to make
the mouse automatically sync up with the laptop's bluetooth instead of
me having to manually tell the laptop to add the mouse after every cold
boot. Interestingly though, the mouse stays sync'd up across reboots.

Rudy

"M.I.5¾" <no.one@no.where.NO_SPAM.co.uk> wrote:
I doubt an XP-created setup disc would work on Vista. Besides, the
laptop doesn't even have a floppy drive.

I've done all this.

I just found out that occasionally my laptop's IP is not what I would
expect from my accesspoint firewall router's DHCP. It should assign
local IPs 192.168.1.100 and up. But sometimes when the connection makes
it only to local (no Internet!) I find IPs such as 169.254.39.177
assigned to the laptop. I have no idea how that happens (unless I hooked
up to an "evil twin" router instead of my own!?) but that would explain
why sometimes thinks just don't work for me.

Any thoughts on that?

Rudy

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
R. P. <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote:

Yes - turn off DHCP on the router and give each of your PCs a unique fixed
IP address in the same range.
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote:
OK, but wouldn't this be a problem at some public hot spots I might want
to use my laptop? I mean some other user might have his or her laptop
set to the same static IP address my laptop is set to.

Rudy?

R. P. wrote:
address.
Plus your wireless software should enable you to setup a custom profile
that has specific properties for your home network, and generic
properties for other networks.

--
The RIGHT REVEREND G.G. WILLIKERS
(formerly) Monsignor Boddom

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
R. P. <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote:

Yes, but it's easy enough to go into the network setup and select "Obtain IP
address automatically" when using a hotspot - and then putting it back to a
fixed IP when using it at home.

Or, as someone else has suggested, you may be able to do it with profiles -
but I haven't really explored that.
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote:
I noticed that the TCP/IPv4 protocol has an alternate configuration
option which I set to static IP address and leaving the main one to get
automatic assignment from the router. This seems to work for me. Also,
there is the "Customize" option for each WLAN connection which can be
made Private or Public. So that way I could have one for home and the
other for public Wi-FI use. So those are two profiles there. I just
haven't tried the latter one yet.

Thanks, guys, again for the help.

Rudy

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote in message
news:61840pF1tj059U1@mid.individual.net...
Some routers won't allow access to the internet if they do not allocate the
IP address.

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
M.I.5¾ <no.one@no.where.NO_SPAM.co.uk> wrote:


Are you *sure*? I've never seen one like that. What make and model?
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote:
I allocated a specific IP address for my desktop PC in the 192.168.1.x
range and my IP based web cam also has a preset IP address in the same
range and they all work fine with the router. But then, the router also
assigns IP addresses in the same range and as long as its assignment
scheme does not conflict with the static IPs, there is no problem.

By the way, my printer is now accessible from the laptop just fine after
some fiddling with Norton's firewall "trusted sites" setting. Once the
current subscription for Norton expires, it will be off my laptop along
with other HP preinstalled crapware.

Rudy

In an earlier contribution to this discussion,
R. P. <r_pol12gar@hotmail.com> wrote:

Does the router *need* to allocate addresses? If everything now has a fixed
address, you can turn DHCP off. Or you can restrict the range of addresses
handed out by the router, and use fixed IPs which are outside of that range
but still in the same subnet.

Norton seems to be very good at *stopping* things from working. The free
version of ZoneAlarm does the business for me. I suggest you replace Norton
with that. [It's actually quite difficult to find - the links on the ZA site
tend to steer you towards the paid-for version!]
--
Cheers,
Roger
______
Email address maintained for newsgroup use only, and not regularly
monitored.. Messages sent to it may not be read for several weeks.
PLEASE REPLY TO NEWSGROUP!

"Roger Mills" <watt.tyler@googlemail.com> wrote in message
news:61j0koF1v9f5hU1@mid.individual.net...