Multiple USB Printers of Same Model

I am trying to connect 5 Epson R2880 printers to one computer (Win7 pro).
These are USB only - no Ethernet.

What is the best way to do this?

My purpose to to set them all as shared, connect a wireless router and share those 5 printers with 20 other laptops in a classroom.

My intention was to install all 5 - with unique names and just share them. Easy - -or so I *THOUGHT!*

BUT only one printer will install. When I plug in additional printers - nothing happens since the drivers were installed for the first printer.

How do I get Win7 to "see" the others and uniquely address the USB port that it is plugged into.

Worse yet, I only have 2 USB ports on the laptop, so I need to use a hub.

Thanks for ideas.

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UsernameIssues said:

A belated welcome to the Seven Forums.

I too would like to know the answer to this - so I subscribed to the thread when you first posted. I don't have any way to test my theory, but my guess is that printers 2 thru x would have to be set up manually - creating a USB printer port for each one. If you find a solution, please post it. Thx

_________


USB printers were not designed to be used as multiple printer systems working from a single PC. If you had two different model printers using different drivers on the same computer you could get away with that. The drawback is the computer will start bogging down if asked to make multiple printer jobs over USB. USB printer drives were not designed to operate in multiple print jobs as like what you want to do.

One work around is to have a computer for each USB printer, and assign a unique name to each computer. They must be working in the same domain. Then it will be possible to network across to each computer and use its printer. The computer and printer must all be set to share with the parameter for everyone.

The proper way to do what you want, is to have network printers. They can be all connected to an Ethernet switch which is connected to a port on the source router or source switch. Each printer can be assigned to its own unique fixed IP address, and unique name; using network share mode. Now, you can set up your user stations to print to the IP address (as according to how the documentation of the printer specifies).

An even better way is to set up a printer server. This would avoid bottle necking and timeouts during heavy print traffic. The printer server will have to have a dual Ethernet card system, and use the proper setup to internally route to the printers all on a secondary switch. There are a number of ways this can be done. There is a lot of information available about how to set up printer servers.



Jerry G.

[QUOTE=Jerryg50;1853028]I am trying to connect 5 Epson R2880 printers to one computer (Win7 pro).
These are USB only - no Ethernet.

What is the best way to do this?

My purpose to to set them all as shared, connect a wireless router and share those 5 printers with 20 other laptops in a classroom.

My intention was to install all 5 - with unique names and just share them. Easy - -or so I *THOUGHT!*

BUT only one printer will install. When I plug in additional printers - nothing happens since the drivers were installed for the first printer.

How do I get Win7 to "see" the others and uniquely address the USB port that it is plugged into.

Worse yet, I only have 2 USB ports on the laptop, so I need to use a hub.

Thanks for ideas.

_________

UsernameIssues said:

A belated welcome to the Seven Forums.

I too would like to know the answer to this - so I subscribed to the thread when you first posted. I don't have any way to test my theory, but my guess is that printers 2 thru x would have to be set up manually - creating a USB printer port for each one. If you find a solution, please post it. Thx

_________


USB printers were not designed to be used as multiple printer systems working from a single PC. If you had two different model printers using different drivers on the same computer you could get away with that. The drawback is the computer will start bogging down if asked to make multiple printer jobs over USB. USB printer drives were not designed to operate in multiple print jobs as like what you want to do.

One work around is to have a computer for each USB printer, and assign a unique name to each computer. They must be working in the same domain. Then it will be possible to network across to each computer and use its printer. The computer and printer must all be set to share with the parameter for everyone.

The proper way to do what you want, is to have network printers. They can be all connected to an Ethernet switch which is connected to a port on the source router or source switch. Each printer can be assigned to its own unique fixed IP address, and unique name; using network share mode. Now, you can set up your user stations to print to the IP address (as according to how the documentation of the printer specifies).

An even better way is to set up a printer server. This would avoid bottle necking and timeouts during heavy print traffic. The printer server will have to have a dual Ethernet card system, and use the proper setup to internally route to the printers all on a secondary switch. There are a number of ways this can be done. There is a lot of information available about how to set up printer servers.


:)