Hi all,
I just picked up a new powerbook, my first mac. It's pretty slick. I'm having a problem printing, however. The new powerbook does not have a parallel port. My laser printer doesn't have any other kind of output, so I'm trying to figure out what the most sensible way to print would be. I haven't had a problem getting the two machines to talk over a crosstalk cable. Some of the printing possibilities that I've considered:
-Most obviously: a converter from a parallel port to USB. I can't find a converter like this and am not sure that one exists.
-Samba : poking around a bit with Samba looks like it might allow the Mac to pick up a Windows shared printer, although I'm not sure about this. The books on Samba I've seen at local bookstores make it sound like services can only be shared out by a UNIX/Linux machine. Of course, if I could connect the mac, I could share it out from the Mac, but that's not really helpful.
-Well, of the solutions that have come to mind, the most lame is simply setting up the http server on the mac, and then putting files that need to be printed in the public folder. I can open them from the web browser on the PC (which will call up Word or whatever else is needed) and print them from the PC. It's not so terrible, but it really seems like there should be a more direct method.
Any ideas?
I just picked up a new powerbook, my first mac. It's pretty slick. I'm having a problem printing, however. The new powerbook does not have a parallel port. My laser printer doesn't have any other kind of output, so I'm trying to figure out what the most sensible way to print would be. I haven't had a problem getting the two machines to talk over a crosstalk cable. Some of the printing possibilities that I've considered:
-Most obviously: a converter from a parallel port to USB. I can't find a converter like this and am not sure that one exists.
-Samba : poking around a bit with Samba looks like it might allow the Mac to pick up a Windows shared printer, although I'm not sure about this. The books on Samba I've seen at local bookstores make it sound like services can only be shared out by a UNIX/Linux machine. Of course, if I could connect the mac, I could share it out from the Mac, but that's not really helpful.
-Well, of the solutions that have come to mind, the most lame is simply setting up the http server on the mac, and then putting files that need to be printed in the public folder. I can open them from the web browser on the PC (which will call up Word or whatever else is needed) and print them from the PC. It's not so terrible, but it really seems like there should be a more direct method.
Any ideas?
Holy Dogcow!