Shared printer very slow with Windows Firewall

[jfrensen]

My shared printer has been incredibly slow since I installed XP SP2
and Windows Firewall. Viewing the printer properties dialog from
a client machine takes almost a minute, and the spooling is painfully
slow.

My configuration:
-- 3 XP SP2 computers behind a SOHO firewall router
-- IP addresses via DHCP
-- Windows Firewall set to enable file and print sharing on all 3
computers
-- One of the PCs has a local printer that it shares out to my
local network.

Printing from the PC with the local printer is fast. Printing
from a client PC is agony.

Today, I tried disabling Windows Firewall on the PC with the printer.
This instantly fixed the printing problem -- the client PCs were almost
as fast as the PC with the local printer.

I enabled Windows Firewall again, went to the Advanced tab and turned
on logging of dropped packets. When I tried printing from a client
PC, I found that numerous TCP 135 packets were being received from
the client PC and dropped. So, on the PC with the local printer,
I used Windows Firewall to add an exception for TCP port 135, subnet
only. Printing from the client PCs was fast again.

Can someone explain why I need this port open to share a printer?
I believe that TCP 135 is the RPC Port Mapper, and is typically closed.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

It's the DCOM service... see:
http://grc.com/port_135.htm

What make/model of printer(s) are you using?

 

[jfrensen]

The printer is a Canon i850