Connect printer to router via USB

I am of the undersatnding that the print file is formed on the desktop
machine and then it is fired off to the printer, it matters not if the
printer is connected to the machine directly or the printer is on the
network. The print file arrives at the printer and is printed.

So, grab the printer, and connect directly to the W7 machine. Does it print?
If so there is a networking issue.

 

Installing the latest firmware would be a good move.
Seeing it works with XP, perhaps there is an authentication issue
between Win 7 and the print server, the sort of thing that might be
fixed by a firmware update.

 

The printer works fine when connected to a computer by USB.

 

In case I haven't made it clear enough (in several attempts), I can
access this printer wirelessly from other (XP) machines. I believe I
also said that I set it up according to the Vodafone instructions, i.e.
via 192.168.1.1.

 

Of course. As I said, I set the printer up according to the specified
procedure, and the printer shows up as enabled Connected Equipment on
the router.

 

I installed it. No change :-(

 

The Vodafone guys suggested booting up in Safe Mode with network.
Unfortunately the printer does not appear in the list when I do that,
and adding a printer fails because the print spooler service is not
running. It was not possible to start the print spooler because another
service it depended on was not running ... I gave up up on it there.

 

The Vodafone guys on that forum have thrown in the towel.

 

Thanks EMB, always glad to get more suggestions. Unfortunately SNMP is
not enabled.

 

You might like to verify for sure that the port is actually open
through the Windows firewall. Try to use telnet to connect to that
port. You may need to install telnet first - on my Vista box that is
under Control Panel / Programs / Turn Windows features on or off.

From a command prompt:

telnet 192.162.1.1 631

If telnet does connect, you can exit it using Ctrl-] then the quit
command. If the connection fail or times out, then either the
firewall is not open on that port, or the router is not set up to use
that port correctly - you should try again after temporarily disabling
the entire Windows firewall (and disconnecting your router from the
Internet for safety if necessary).

BTW Are you using the builtin Windows firewall, or the one in your
anti-virus software (eg Norton)? I have had problems with Norton 360
not opening ports when needed, and had to open them manually. But I
do have a complex network that has Vista confused.

 

Hi Stephen, this sounds very promising! I turned the telnet client on,
then did 'telnet 192.168.1.1 631'. I just get a blank telnet window,
there's no indication that it's connected. If I type something it comes
back with:
HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found
Connection: close
Connection to host lost.

Does this indicate a failure to connect?

 

I'm just using the built-in Windows firewall (Windows Defender?). I'll
explore your suggestion of disabling it.

Thanks

 

Judging by what I see when I try a different port number (an immediate
message saying the connection failed) it seems that the connection to
port 631 is successful. Disabling the Windows firewall had no effect.

This seems to indicate that the problem is with the printer, not the router.

 

No, That indicates that you *did* connect. The server in the router
returned the 404 error that you see.

Cheers,

Cliff

 

That conclusively proves that the firewall is not blocking the port.
You are getting a response from some sort of server software that does
HTTP protocol (like a web server, but lots of other things also use
HTTP protocol).

Since it understands HTTP, you might like to now try with your web
browser - use this URL:

http://192.168.1.1:631

and see if you get a response.

 

I see a completely blank page.

 

Any further thoughts, Stephen?

Gib