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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Printing to Windows Workgroup From Mac

umaetz - Aug 19, 2005 - 2:52 pm

I setup my new iBook G4 this week in an existing Windows XP workgroup WLAN at home. Everything works perfect except the printing.

Although I can properly select the workgroup, the PC, the printer and the printer model (HP DeskJet) I have not been able to get one single page out of the printer. No error message on the iBook. It prints to the queue and ... nothing happens on the printer side :-(

I have used all tipps I found on the web so far, including something I found here. Nothing helped. Namely: I have established a windows user with password. I even tried to set the configuration up as IP printer as described here. No change.

Any ideas? I am beginning to get a little desperate.

Otherwise everything is great and I have the feeling this will not be the last Mac in the family ;-)

Thanks
Uschi

gsahli - Aug 19, 2005 - 3:31 pm

Hi,
I'm Greg, your Volunteer Tech. I sincerely enjoy helping people set up their Mac so they can enjoy using it. I try, through a series of short interactions with you, to get enough information to help you. Please don't expect me to solve the problem without giving me more info or not telling me when I haven't yet fixed the problem.

I wish someone else out there (like Apple) was explaining this - the HP-provided drivers don't support network/Windows printing. The drivers bypass CUPS, so the only comm protocol you can use is what is written into the driver -- USB.
Apple tried to get around this problem (manufacturers not writing CUPS driver) by including Gimp-Print in Panther and Tiger. But Gimp-Print only has a few HP models.

Please try installing the hpijs and ESP ghostscript driver set from:
http://www.linuxprinting.org/macosx/hpijs/

It sounds like you already know how to add the printer in Printer Setup.

Good luck.

umaetz - Aug 20, 2005 - 2:45 am

Thanks for the suggestion.

I installed both drivers and Ghostprint without problems. Added the printer with the new drivers. But no change.

What perplexes me is that everybody writing about windows workgroup printing problems gets their printer to spit out at least something. And then it´s all about how to get the printer work correctly. In my case the printer does nothing.

I guess I will also check some windows forums. Maybe I have some eeny beeny little thing wrong on the windows side and with a small change all of a sudden everything works.

Regards
Uschi

P.S.: yesterday I transferred my iPod files without problems over the windows network

gsahli - Aug 20, 2005 - 4:20 am

Uschi,
I have never failed to get this to work... Including helping several Hundred people to get it to work.

This time, did you get any error messages? Were you asked for a usernameassword?

Please review this:
http://www.efelix.co.uk/tech/3004.html

an alternative:
http://www.efelix.co.uk/tech/3009.html
(note - with Tiger, to get to the Advanced menu, you hold down the option key while clicking on More Printers, after already clicking ADD.)

umaetz - Aug 20, 2005 - 4:57 am

Two pages I had already visited. That´s (almost) exactly how it looks on my PC and iBook. Everything regarding sharing and setting up the printer on the iBook works fine, but in the end no peep by the printer.

Now I even changed the name of my XP computer (shorter, now special characters) to make sure that is correct with Mac naming standards. Same story.

Now I found something in the Printer Utility on the iBook. When I click info and review name&location I gett all the details I set up correctly. Only under the section Host-Name I have a blank field. Shouldn´t there be the name of my XP workgroup computer? (Printer Name:HPDJ710C Location:MAETZNETZ Name of the queue:HPDJ710C Host-Name: driver and PDD version)

Uschi

P.S.: I am running Mac OS X v10.4.2 and it seems to me from other users postings that especially this OS version makes trouble with windows printing

umaetz - Aug 20, 2005 - 5:00 am

to your questions: I was asked for username and password and entered a user account with password on the xp computer. no error messages. the iBook even prints to a queue shows percentage complete and then finishes. but no output at the pc.

Uschi

umaetz - Aug 20, 2005 - 6:22 am

currently I have an error message at least.

The process "SMB" stopped unexpectedly with message 1.

iBook trys to connect and cannot. Spooled jobs are being halted.

gsahli - Aug 20, 2005 - 9:11 am

Well, the SMB process is what communicates to Windows, so that's a major problem.

Try Printer Setup Repair from www.fixamac.net.

Thanks for all the great feedback - I wish I could get more clients to tell me what they've tried!