"Unseeable" printer

[Guest]

Have a WesternDigital NetCenter (network accessible storage unit with a 250GB
drive and two USB ports able to host additional storage or printers) an
HP1320 printer is on one USP port. The NetCenter has an IP address (I have
tried static and DHCP assigned by my router) and as far as I know it uses
standard protocols. This all still works fine under WindowsXP (the rest of my
network) but not with my one Vista Ultimate box (in a Private Network).

I manged to install the printer (not even sure how) under Vista but it stays
in a near perpetual state of "Opening" if I look at its status. Merely having
it set as the default printer causes merely opening Word or Outlook to stall
my entire system for ~5 minutes. Since this is the only true printer I have
here, I have set up CutePDF print-to-file up as the default to kludege past
this and at least be able to check e-mail.

If I select something to actually print, say, in Notepad. I see the circular
hourglass for 5 minutes, then it goes away and nothing prints. Then I can use
the print dialog again, however, and the document prints immediately. Yet if
I open the Network dialog nothing representative of the NetCenter is visable
there.

The drive on the NetCenter sets up easy and access to shares on it are fine,
even though no device with the those appears in the Network dialog. I can
also use it HTML page based set-up just fine from IE7 in Vista.

Any suggestions how to make Vista see the printer better?

I will cross-post this in the Printers Community too, but I see it foremost
as a Vista does not play well on a network problem. I feel that Vista should
at least "see" everything on a network, including the NetCenter as at least
an IP addressable device, even if it has some native commands issues.

Any suggestions on Vista utilities (e.g., logging) that I can use to get
more information on this?

TY in advance.

 

[Chuck]

Have a WesternDigital NetCenter (network accessible storage unit with a 250GB
drive and two USB ports able to host additional storage or printers) an
HP1320 printer is on one USP port. The NetCenter has an IP address (I have
tried static and DHCP assigned by my router) and as far as I know it uses
standard protocols. This all still works fine under WindowsXP (the rest of my
network) but not with my one Vista Ultimate box (in a Private Network).

I manged to install the printer (not even sure how) under Vista but it stays
in a near perpetual state of "Opening" if I look at its status. Merely having
it set as the default printer causes merely opening Word or Outlook to stall
my entire system for ~5 minutes. Since this is the only true printer I have
here, I have set up CutePDF print-to-file up as the default to kludege past
this and at least be able to check e-mail.

If I select something to actually print, say, in Notepad. I see the circular
hourglass for 5 minutes, then it goes away and nothing prints. Then I can use
the print dialog again, however, and the document prints immediately. Yet if
I open the Network dialog nothing representative of the NetCenter is visable
there.

The drive on the NetCenter sets up easy and access to shares on it are fine,
even though no device with the those appears in the Network dialog. I can
also use it HTML page based set-up just fine from IE7 in Vista.

Any suggestions how to make Vista see the printer better?

I will cross-post this in the Printers Community too, but I see it foremost
as a Vista does not play well on a network problem. I feel that Vista should
at least "see" everything on a network, including the NetCenter as at least
an IP addressable device, even if it has some native commands issues.

Any suggestions on Vista utilities (e.g., logging) that I can use to get
more information on this?

TY in advance.

Ray,

I'm normally a little skeptical of NAS units, including the NetCenter.
According to the reviews, NetCenter drive access requires installing a
configuration manager, but even with that installed, the security options are
about like Simple File Sharing. Not too configurable there.

But the printers are supposedly install transparent to the NetCenter. You find
a printer that's attached to the NetCenter in the Windows AddPrinter wizard, and
load the printer drivers if necessary.

So in this case, I'd wonder of you have Vista compliant drivers for the HP1320?
Have you tested the printer, connected directly to the Vista computer? From the
Vista computer, connected directly to the XP computer? Networking printers
involves some issues that networking files don't. The drivers can vary - by
operating system, and by how the printer is connected.
<http://nitecruzr.blogspot.com/2007/05/file-sharing-and-printer-sharing-are.html>
http://nitecruzr.blogspot.com/2007/05/file-sharing-and-printer-sharing-are.html