Networking from Printer attached to Win XP PC to Win 7

I also want to thank this brilliant mind what shared this solution with us :)
I normally would go to \\computername and hit conect to install the printer.
This always worked betwin xp machines.

Now that I have a windows 7, I needed to install the shared printer installed on XP on to Win7.

No drivers on epson site and I way getting error trying to install the way I mentioned above.

Finally I found this thread as shorted it out.
Thanks a million :)

jimbo45, your instructions are heaven sent!
I struggled over 2 days getting to print from Win7 PC onto the XP connected printer without success.
I changed the workgroup and homegroup,
I tried standard TCP/IP ports and virtual USB ports,
went thru lots of checklists and instructions,
then your's solved my problem in minutes!

It seems MS still doesn't address this problem in their help/support sites!

Thanks

WOW - that is spot on. I struggled all last weekend on this and nobody anywhere could come up with anything. My original post

https://www.sevenforums.com/network-s...d-network.html

should have been more general. But thanks for a very simple workaround.

Jeff

This is probably the best piece of advice I've had in a long time... I was getting ready to drop the printer out of a 2nd floor window I was that frustrated with it. Don't know how many different drivers and methods I used trying to install this damned HP 5225 across the network from an XP machine! Simple solution but certainly not obvious. Thank you for saving my company £1000 on a new printer!

the1paulcole said:

This is probably the best piece of advice I've had in a long time... I was getting ready to drop the printer out of a 2nd floor window I was that frustrated with it. Don't know how many different drivers and methods I used trying to install this damned HP 5225 across the network from an XP machine! Simple solution but certainly not obvious. Thank you for saving my company £1000 on a new printer!

Hi there
I should send an invoice !!!!

Glad it all worked for you

Sometimes the easiest solutions are the hardest to find !!!

Cheers
jimbo

Hi everyone,

I have a HP C8180 Photosmart printer that would not work with my new Windows 7 pc. I did the research, went thru HP online and downloaded the newer drivers and everything seems to be okay with my new machine so far. BUT, since I did that, my son's Vista pc will not connect to the printer. He uninstalls his driver and re-installs it in order to connect to the printer. He has to do this on every re-start now.

My question is this: If he updates his driver thru HP online for his Vista pc the way I did for my Windows 7 pc, will it change anything on the printer that might screw up my connection or functionality with it???

The Vista driver is clearly a different driver than the Windows 7 driver on the HP website. I'm just wondering if downloading another driver on a different pc changes anything in the printer itself, or just on the pc.

Thank you.

My problem is that my printer is an HP Laserjet 4 plus. Hp wants me to upgrade. Honestly I can't find a driver that will use that shared printer off an XP Prro PC.... to save my life!! HP says .... Migrate & Upgrade

I have a Dell XPS 4150 XP Pro machine with a Canon MP530 printer attached. This printer is shared and works just fine on the 3 other XP machines that I have. However it will not work with the 4 Win 7 machines. You state:

1) Ensure Printer on XP machine is shared - assume it's called SHAREDPRINTER.

2) On the Network Browsing on your W7 machine ensure you can "See" the Printer share.

What if the Win 7 machine DOES NOT "See" the printer share? It is obviously shared as it is seen on the three XP machines. I have tried to enter \\DELL4150\MP530 (which is the computer name and printer name) but it always asks me for the "Windows Security, Enter Network Password, Username and Password" even though I have NEVER set any passwords on any of these computers.

HELP please!

jimbo45 said:

Hi there
I've posted on this before but to share Printers attached to XP computers with either X-64 or X-32 versions of W7 is SIMPLE. These instructions are for the Printer attached to the XP machine (but works in reverse as well).

("Stand alone" Network printers can be done slightly similarly BTW).

assume the computers are call XPMACHINE and W7MACHINE.

1) Ensure Printer on XP machine is shared - assume it's called SHAREDPRINTER.

2) On the Network Browsing on your W7 machine ensure you can "See" the Printer share.

Now on the W7 machine do the following (doesn't matter if it's X-86 or x-64).

3) Control Panel==> add LOCAL (Yes LOCAL) printer. I know it's on a Network but hold your horses -- what we are actually doing is "Poodlefaking" the W7 machine into thinking it's running the printer.

4) Create NEW port==>Local port

5) Portname is \\XPMACHINE\SHAREDPRINTER

6) Now W7 will load a driver and you'll be able to print on the XP machine.

Simple

(For a "Network stand alone printer") at 4) chose TCPIP port
and at 5) enter the IP address.


If the printer is on the W7 machine and you want to print on the XP machine then do the same instructions on the XP machine --
port name in this case will be \\W7MACHINE\SHAREDPRINTER

Cheers
jimbo

Poodlefaking! Love it! I have spent SOOOO many hours trying to get my laser printer to work from Win7 to an old XP. I can not believe how simple it was. I have found so many posts telling others the "right way" to do it, and none of those posts had their issues resolved. I couldn't get my Brother HL-5040 to print no matter what I tried, but this totally worked! Thank you for taking the time to post this way back in 2009.
Mike

Thanks Jimbo45! I had looked up how to share printers via XP/Win7 for a few days and frankly it was just pure frustration. I started looking up the error codes I was getting this one happened to be "operation failed with error 0x00004005" that's how I found this forum and your easy solution. My printer CanonMX310 was the issue and not being able to find the driver .inf. Even though I loaded the drivers on the win7 machine and pointed directly to the thing. Thank you, thank you THANK YOU, for your quick fix and caring enough to post again! ; )