Print from XP to shared printer on mini?

[DVDSP]

My wife uses a Dell running XP for work and sometimes she wants to print at home instead of waiting to be in the office. She always ends up emailing herself the document to her home address and printing it on our Mac, but I figure there could be a better way. After all, she is connected to the same router that all our Macs are on and we all share an Internet connection.

Is there a simple way to set this up? Keep in mind that I have absolutely zero admin access to her computer, her company keeps it locked down tight (to the point where she can't even install Palm software without a call to the IT department to send someone down).

Thanks in advance,

John

 

[BlueRevolution]

from my experience, it requires a lot of tinkering on the Windows box and very little on the Mac to get that working. so without admin rights I doubt you could do that. you might want to think about getting a router with a print server though, since that would require less configuration.

 

[Gee]

Haven't tried it myself, but it should be a simple matter of turning on Windows Sharing in the Sharing > Services section of System Preferences on the Mini, and turning on Share this Printer in the Print and Fax system pref.

Then on the PC, go to Add Printer in the control panels, click through to the bit where you can browse for network printers, and hey presto - should be there. Probably ;-)

 

[balamw]

I have absolutely zero admin access to her computer, her company keeps it locked down tight

You can't install most printer drivers without admin rights, so you're pretty much SOL unless the driver you need is already installed or you can get IT to install it.

BTW This kind of experience is what convinced my wife to buy the Mac. She borrowed a laptop from work and couldn't even get her company issued USB key to work with it.

B

 

[ITASOR]

In my house, I have an iBook G4 connected via wireless to a Linksys WRT54G. My dad and sister have Windows laptops, and a DELL desktop. I set all of their computers up to print wirelessly through my iBook, but I did it really weird and I can't really remember.

I shared the printer in system preferences under sharing, enabled Window sharing for my account on my iBook, and then set the printers up in XP as a URL printer, meaning it prints to something like http://iBookG4:port/.printers/hp_deskjet_5550 or something. The XP computer uses the generic Post script driver for an Apple printer I think.

I pretty much just tried everything until it works. Messed around with CUPS and stuff, but I never really changed anything.

I figure when this method stops working, I'll get an Airport Express, which assigns the USB printer an IP that XP can easily print to.

 

[MRU]

I found that to print from Pc's to a printer on a mac network, it's easier to download Bonjour from apple support. Install it on your pc and run the bonjour printer wizard. It finds the printers on the macs and enables full sharing on the pc.

 

[DVDSP]

Thanks for your input

Unfortunately, I was stymied by IT. When I was trying to add the printer in XP the option to browse for a printer on a home network is grayed out. My wife is going to try to get that resolved but that won't happen until Thursday at the earliest.

At least now I know where I need to start on XP.

Thanks again!