Any MAC/Windows tech wizards? Printing issues!

[amalgam786]

Hi Guys!

Knowing we've some proper smart people in the forum thought I'd ask here first!

I find that when trying to print to my HP Laser wifi printer its ok when using macs, but if i set up any of the windows machines to print to it then the macs will all stop working and vice versa. I have to then cycle the printer and which ever computer thats not working delete and reinstall the printer drivers before it works again? any idea whats happening here? Im assuming that macs are connecting via AirPrint and the windows ones by its own protocol but seems that one system disturbs the other some how - please help as i've not got much more hair left to pull out!

ta!

[SydR]

How is the printer connected to the Macs and PCs?

[amalgam786]

How is the printer connected to the Macs and PCs?

WiFi - nothing wired

[SydR]

May be worth giving your printer a fixed IP address and printing to that from each device using TCP/IP.

You can either fix the IP address on the printer itself or set your router to allocate a specific address to your printer by mapping it’s MAC address to it.

I’ve done the latter at home and have a number of Windows, Mac, IOS and Android devices printing to it without issue.

[amalgam786]

set your router to allocate a specific address to your printer by mapping it’s MAC address to it.

Gonna see if i can try this (have a virgin media hub)

Also will the assigned IP address remain the same even if the router/hub is cycled on and off

[Scepticalist]

Gonna see if i can try this (have a virgin media hub)

Also will the assigned IP address remain the same even if the router/hub is cycled on and off

If you give the printer a manual IP address it'll be on that regardless of whatever your router does or if your router is even switched on.

This is not the same as reserving an IP address on your router, which will simply ensure that it always gets the same IP when it asks for one.

[SydR]

If you give the printer a manual IP address it'll be on that regardless of whatever your router does or if your router is even switched on.

This is not the same as reserving an IP address on your router, which will simply ensure that it always gets the same IP when it asks for one.

I chose to reserve an IP address on the router as it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve swapped routers and wondered why I couldn’t ‘see’ the printer only to remember it’s probably on a different subnet

It also prevents someone making the mistake of giving it an IP address that is likely to be allocated by the router thus conflicting when the printer gets turned on.