I dont know the proper name for it my situation is that this desktop pc im using right now is the main computer where the printer is hooked up to. I have 2 lap tops, (moms and sis) and w/e they need something printed, they always email me the file so I can print it. BUt this is getting annoying now and I dont know how to set it up so that they can print it from there lap tops instead of always sending me the files to print. So can someone plz direct me to a site that has a detail set by step guide on how to set something up like that or someone here on the borads can help me out plz? I would really appreciate it, thanks. BTW, this main pc is windows xp, moms lap top is xp, and sis is vista.
take your pick: easiest---> have them put document on usb flash drive and wlk over and plug it into your puter to print (under $10) networking ---> computer that has printer plugged into it will have to be on anyways right now i'm slipping a wireless pci card into a puter that has a 700 celeron, 380 MB RAM, 30gig HD. ...since it's low power and doesnt heat up the room i can leave it on all the time....i'll be plugging two printers with bullt in scanners and a stand alone scanner into it...that should make all the equipment accessible to all the puters all depends on your budget and equipment and sometimes junk let me know what youre using ie: router and how you want it set up
sweet, well the way I want to have it set up is that i have the printer connected to my desktop pc, and sharing the printer on the network wireless to the 2 laptops. The wireless router I have is this one: http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-WRTP5...2?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1197053286&sr=8-2 from what I understand, I have to setup a network first, so that the pc's can "talk" to each other and then from there, I just enable printer sharing and they should be able to print from there laptops as long as I have the desktop pc on b/c its plugged into that. I used to have my setup like that but for some reason my settings got all messed up and I can't even set up a network again. I cannot remember the way I did it and I tried multiple times and fail. So with you help I would really appreciate getting this working again. Thanks in advance
Sorry i'm late replying Setting up a network is easy use a flash drive if all puters have usb ports turn on all computers on XP computer go to network read http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/networking/setup/homenet.mspx When you get to 14. dont check "finish the wizard" but instead check "create a network disk" follow directions and place the small program on the usb drive then plug it into each drive and double click the icon let me know how you made out
i messed that post up after you have the small program on your usb drive then plug it into each computer and double click the icon rest should be automatic
wow, I give up on this, this is getting me really frustrated. I did exactly wut that link said to do, in the end made it save to a usb drive i had, I ran it first on my mom's xp laptop. Ran it, the same process that I did on this main pc it made me go through is again on the laptop, nothing was automatic. When that was done, took the usb drive out, ran it on my sis vista laptop. Same thing occurred with setting up only this time in the end it said failed. I go to view workgroups from my desktop pc, nothing shows up, I go to viewwork groups on my mom's paltop, I see my sisters laptop on there but I cant open it, says it's not accessible. and on my sis vista laptop honestly i have no idea how to view a workgroup on it b/c im not familiar with vista LOL. wow wow, this is not working for me =( any advise?
You have to make sure that the firewall on the other computers are set to accept the ip addresses of each other.
