Weird printer sharing issue - XP and Win7

[FayeC]

Hi,

I have 5 computers networked. 3 are Win 7 and 2 are XP Pro SP3.
The printer is connected to an XP machine and can be seen by all computers.
They are all in the same workgroup.
The 2 XP computers can share the printer normally and as long as the machine with the printer is on I can print without problems.
The 3 Win7 machines cannot.
I have tried all tricks I found here. I added the printer to Win7 as a local printer and added a local port that points to the XP machine (//XPComputer/Printer). That didn't work either and it seems to be the way people get it to work between XP and Win7.
I tried adding a network printer and although it sees the printer in the printer list, it hangs adding the printer or after adding the printer I get error 0x0000000d or 0x00000716. I looked these up but couldn't find anything that helped me solve the problem.
There seems to be some sort of authentication issue between the XP machine and the Win7 ones.
One tidbit of information, the XP machines are both using NetBEUI. Not sure if that is causing the issue or not. Haven't tried to disable it.
Has anybody fixed anything similar??
Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,

FayeC

 

[chev65]

Maybe this tutorial will show you the steps needed for it to work correctly.
Share Files and Printers between Windows 7 and XP :: the How-To Geek

 

[FayeC]

Thank you for the post but I had already gone through that and many other tutorials on how to set up file and printer sharing between XP and Win7 and nothing has worked so far. I also tried:
http://www.sevenforums.com/network-sharing/7527-networking-printer-attached-win-xp-pc-win-7-a.html and it didn't work either.

The printer is connected to the XP machine. I have also tried to connect it to the Windows 7 machine but it won't install it because when I run the driver package I got from Lexmark I keep getting a "The installer found an older version of the driver, please uninstall and try running this setup again". I never had a printer installed on the Win 7 machine, I checked the System32 folder for any possible lexmark driver left there and nothing shows.

As for the XP machine, it allows connections to the other XP machine without password but when the Win 7 tried to access it it keeps asking for a password. I set the security settings for the printer to allow full control to anyone just to see if that was the problem and it still won't allow the printer to be used.

Just for the record I am logging in to the machines using my administrator account.

The Win 7 computers can see the printer as a shared item in the network but not use it. Another tidbit of information is that although the Win 7 can see and browse the other 2 XP computers when I try to browse the XP computer to which the printer is connected it asks me for a username and password while the other XP can be browsed without that.
I never had any special or different setting for it so I am not sure what is causing the extra step to access the files.

The only thing preventing me from installing WIndows 7 on the XP box at this point is the fact that I am not sure of that system's parts compatibility to Windows 7. Otherwise I would have gone ahead and switched it. I might do that on the laptop running win XP but I need to figure out the printer issue first. Right now I only have 2 computers that can print to the printer. I need to have all 5 printing to it.

Any help is very appreciated,

FayeC

 

[wenlom]

any luck?

Hi FayeC -

Did you have any luck with your printer issue? I'm having a somewhat similar issue - though my printer is attached via cable to my Vista machine. I can't print via wifi to it from the Windows 7 system, though I have been able to print the test page from the W7 system... it just won't print anything else from any other program.

When I run the troubleshooter in W7, it tells me the W7 computer cannot connect to the printer (this is after it successfully prints the test page). Also, the HP box that pops up for the printer on W7 tells me the printer is "offline" - but it is clearly not, since it just printed the test page.

When I install my printer (connected to another network computer) on the W7, it automatically installs drivers... and I'm wondering if it's installing drivers off my Vista system -- therefore it's installing Vista drivers (which I suspect won't work on W7 b/c I found W7 drivers on the HP site). So... my last ditch effort right now (it's downloading) is to try putting W7 drivers onto the W7 computer before I attempt to install the printer (yet again) to the W7 system.

Anyway, I was wondering if you did manage to find a solution, what was it?

Thanks.

 

[Jacee]

Do you have the same Firewall and anti-virus programs on all machines?

My XP and Windows 7 computers are different than each other. I found that ZoneAlarm (on XP) was blocking Windows 7 from sharing. I manually added my Win7's address to ZoneAlarm so as not to block it.

 

[wenlom]

Jacee -

I did manage to get the W7 to print from a notepad document... but it still won't print from Word/Office or Internet Explorer.

I changed the printer settings on the HP Deskjet/Vista to "render print jobs on client computers" and that's when notepad started printing. Nothing else will, tho.

If notepad prints, and the test documents print... would the firewall permit those but not the others?

I have McAfee on Vista, the W7 has Norton (for now). In McAfee, there's nothing I can change, that I can find on either the Advanced or Basic menus to allow another computer on the network in (or block it) to my system.

 

[Jacee]

You may have to add the actual name of the computer like ... //wenlom-PC or whatever your name is ... //W7-PC

Do you see what I mean, or did I confuse you pretty good?

 

[wenlom]

Jaycee -

Nope, didn't confuse me.

I've actually tried to create a "faux" local port, and use the path as //MyVistaComputer/MyPrintername... I've tried //MSHOME/MyVistaComputer/Printers/MyPrintername (every path imaginable...) When I do that I get messages saying "not a valid path" and "access denied" and "path does not exist"

It's just frustrating b/c it's printing test pages and prints from notepad, but won't print from other programs. When I do try to print from, say, Word, I can hear the printer in the other room make noises, as if it's going to print... the paper feeder or something clunks around a bit, but then it doesn't actually print.

The print jobs show up in the print queue on the W7 computer, but they're not showing up in the print queue on my Vista computer - when there's one sent from W7, that is.

It's making contact, but apparently it's not making full contact.

 

[patwhatsthat]

It may be, that during whatever process you used to get this far along, may have resulted in corrupt drivers or perhaps whatever drivers Win7 got from the Vista machine, provide some limited functionality, but programs like word or excel requre a more robust driver. Try going here, HP Deskjet Full Feature Software and Drivers HP Deskjet F4280 All-in-One Printer - HP Customer Care (United States - English) and select whatever version of Win7 you've installed 32 or 64 bit, download the latest full feature driver pack dated 10/2009 then go to the properties of your printer on the advanced tab and select new driver. It comes in the form of an executeable and while that may work, it's kinda unlikely, you may have to use a utility like 7zip to extract the executeable into a local folder on your computer and point the update driver process to that folder. Hope this helps

 

[mlctulsa]

This may help you (it solved my problem) from Jimbo:

Hi Mods
Maybe you can make this a sticky -- often comes up and I posted a solution yesterday which works.
..............extract from previous post .....
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 Windows 7 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 Windows 7 machine ensure you can "See" the Printer share.

Now on the Windows 7 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 Windows 7 machine into thinking it's running the printer.

4) Create NEW port==>Local port

5) Portname is \\XPMACHINE\SHAREDPRINTER

6) Now Windows 7 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 Windows 7 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

 

[FayeC]

Although your solution might work for most cases it still won't work for mine.
My XP computer does not have a firewall or any script blocking program but for some reason whenever I try to access anything on it it requests username and password. I have checked the permissions and they all have everyone with full control. Not sure what's going on. I might need to reinstall Windows or just bite the bullet and upgrade.
As for the printer issue, I solved it by buying a wireless printer. No more connectivity aggravation. All 5 computers now print properly without fuss.

FayeC

 

[wenlom]

mlctulsa - thanks but I've also tried that solution from Jimbo, which is posted everywhere on this site. (Though my problem with W7 and Vista, unlike Fayec (W7/XP). My W7 computer tells me "invalid path", "access denied" and similar mesages when I attempt to create the fake local printer.

Fayec - have you tried enabling the guest accounts on the computers that won't connect/print together? I just browsed through the thread and didn't see anywhere if you'd tried that.

I was hoping if you'd found a solution, Fayec, maybe it'd work for mine, even tho we're different systems!

 

[Nekton]

Hey y'all,
I just spent several hours yesterday trying to get an XP laptop to print using a printer attached to a Windows 7 desktop. After hours of trying the "local port" method described all over sevenforums.com I tried telling the XP to use the more obvious network printer option. It worked fine! My only problem was choosing the correct printer from the drop-down list in the program that i was trying to print from. There were about 8 choices listed after all my shenanigans, but the proper one was actually the one that said USB on it.

Hope this helps somebody!

 

[Parawood]

Could this be it?

Faye,

Are you using forward slashes instead of backslashes? This could be the issue. Check back to jimbo's tip.

Parawood

Hi,

I have 5 computers networked. 3 are Win 7 and 2 are XP Pro SP3.
The printer is connected to an XP machine and can be seen by all computers.
They are all in the same workgroup.
The 2 XP computers can share the printer normally and as long as the machine with the printer is on I can print without problems.
The 3 Win7 machines cannot.
I have tried all tricks I found here. I added the printer to Win7 as a local printer and added a local port that points to the XP machine (//XPComputer/Printer). That didn't work either and it seems to be the way people get it to work between XP and Win7.
I tried adding a network printer and although it sees the printer in the printer list, it hangs adding the printer or after adding the printer I get error 0x0000000d or 0x00000716. I looked these up but couldn't find anything that helped me solve the problem.
There seems to be some sort of authentication issue between the XP machine and the Win7 ones.
One tidbit of information, the XP machines are both using NetBEUI. Not sure if that is causing the issue or not. Haven't tried to disable it.
Has anybody fixed anything similar??
Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,

FayeC

 

[wenlom]

FayeC

I found a (fairly obvious to me!) solution to my printer problem and thought maybe it might help you as well, if it's something you haven't tried.

Don't know why I didn't try this before, except that I didn't want more than one account on my computer, but...

Printer is on Vista 64-bit system (my computer).
Wanted to wireless print from a Windows 7 computer (my husband's computer).

I created an account on my computer with the same log in and password as the one he has on his W7 computer.

Then I installed the printer, again, on his computer. Worked.

I hope that helps someone!