NT4 / Win2K print networking

[Jman13]

I also posted this in the Tech Support forum.

Ok, here's the problem. I work in a small office with two computers. The main computer, my boss's machine, is running NT 4 (SP4) and has an HP DeskJet 722C printer hooked up to it. I am using a laptop across the room, running Win2000. I need to be able to use her printer through the network. We've installed the most current drivers on her machine, and I have tried to add a network printer. We shared her printer, and gave everyone access to print.

When I add the network printer, I can browse the network, see the printer and select it, but then I get the error message "The Server on which 'HP Deskjet 720C Series v10.3' printer resides does not have the correct printer driver installed. If you want to install the driver on your local computer, click OK."

When I click OK, it asks for an INF file, which I have NO idea where to get. It's not in the windows folder, not in system or system32, and it's not on the Win2K install disk. The drivers you download from HP are in EXE format, and are not extractable, and there aren't win2K drivers for the printer anyway (they're built in). I know the basic drivers are accessible in the OS, because they've been installed already, but apparently what the computer wants for this sharing setup is not found in there. What do I do?

Thanks.

 

[Poontos]

I cannot recall in NT 4.0, but I know that in Win2K, when you are sharing a printer over the network, you can specify that the printer drivers for other OSes are available locally, so others with older Oses can install the printer via the network. See if you can find that in her printer properties...

A couple of other things:

-You said that there aren`t drivers for Win2K, yet they are built-in. So you are sure that this printer will work with Win2K?

-Try uninstalling any printer drivers on your computer and try again.

-The exe you talk about, is it a GUI setup, with Click next, click next, click next, finish, or does it extract files to your temp dir and load them up? Either way, those drivers should be extracted to a temp directory behind the scenes if it is a GUI setup...

I don`t know... 🙂 (that's reassuring, eh?)


Good luck!

 

[dbwillis]

I had this exact same problem the other day (hp722c shared on a NT4 workstation wanting to be used by XP Pro ~tried 2k also)

What you have to do is this:>
use a net use command from a dos prompt to map the printer
(net use lpt3: \\boss's_pc_name\shared_printer_name)

Then install a local printer on the 2k/xp box and select LPT3 (or which ever LPT port you used above)

Worked great for me.
Im not sure about the persistance of the net use (not too DOS educated) but you could put it in a startup.bat file or script.

Good luck!