Can't See Network Printer on Win98 Machine 1

[LRSmith]

Hi everyone - we have taken in employees from our sister offices that were devastated by Katrina. We have a fairly small office here, and I'm the IT "stuckee". Just some background so you know who/what you are dealing with.

The problem I have is this. I can't get these new PCs to print to our network printer. The PCs our displaced employees are bringing have Win98SE as the OS. I have been able to get them on our network (server is Windows Server 2003 and existing clients are all XP). I can ping the IP address of the printer from a 98 machine, see it through Internet explorer, but when I go to install it as a network printer, I can't see it at all.

I have Files and Print Sharing installed, I have installed a 98 printer driver locally on the PCs, but I can't find the blasted printer. IP address and DHCP for the individual PCs are set up automatically by the server, but the printer IP is static.

Any pointers? Thanks in advance!

 

[cdogg]

Yes! In the printer properties (after you have it installed), go to the Details tab and use the "Capture printer port" option.

This option enables you to capture a virtual printer port (LPT2, LPT3, etc...) to a network printer using the format:

\\server\share

Unfortunately, you cannot just enter an IP address due to DOS LPT port limitations. If this is a JetDirect port, then you must install the JetDirect software on each 98 PC. If there is no print server name, then this method will not work. In that case, you might want to consider connecting the printer directly to a workstation and share it out as a workaround for now.

This article may also help:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q133152/

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein
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[LRSmith]

Thanks cdogg - you hit the nail on the head.