USB (printer) to Ethernet / 802.11b/g

[dman]

looking for a relative and never read up on them before...

How compatible are they with the plethora of inkjet printers / brands / etc?
Should I get certain brand adapter to go with certain printer or do they have some generic interface?
Do you lose printing features when you print over wireless instead of direct connect USB?
Do I have to load special drivers from the adapter manuf to use it in XP?
Does anybody actually read the peripherals forum? 🙂

Thanks.

 

[m3a2]

WHat are you asking? ive seen usb to parralel and paralell to usb adapters but unless your talking about a print server I cant see how your gonna run print jobs over a network with an adapter. I have a usb print server and i like it very much, it gives me the option to have someone else use my laser printer without having a computer turned on. normally a printer is connected to a computer is shared over a network. USB print servers are very small compact, you get a wall wart, little box with a usb socket and a ethernet socket, plug it in connect to it using internet exploder or firefox, set parameters, and thats about it, there is software you can load to monitor it and print to it. Win98 and up should have no real problem finding the printer, or you might have to install the software that comes with it, I found one on ebay for around 85 bucks but they are becoming more common and cheaper these days.
Oh and mine is a wired version by the way, there are either stand alone wireless, pricey or get a router with one built in, which would be wired betweeen router and printer.