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Print prob - win2000server & NT4 clients

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by chipw 1 view

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We just set up a computer to act as a dedicated printer server, it's running Win2000. It has a HP8000N on one usb port and a Lexmark E412 on the second usb port. Both printers work fine locally. They are both shared. We have NT4sp6a client machines.They print to the Lexmark just fine. When we try to set up the HP on the NT4 boxes we get an error every time regarding the driver. I don't recall the exact wording but it was very similar to: the chosen driver is unknown. I have never seen such an error before. This is from the driver I downloaded from HP's web site for NT and the 8000N. This is preventing us from being able to use the printer. Anyone else seen such an error?

10 replies

by joseph moore

When you Shared out the printer on the Win2K box, did you select NT4 clients as other drivers to install in addition to the drivers you downloaded? 'Cause with Win2K print servers, you can have drivers for multiple operating systems set to be installed when clients with differen OS's connect.
So, if you did not specify the NT4 drivers in the Sharing tab, do so and try again.

hope this helps

by chipw

We've done that several times, and the checkbox never holds the checkmark. Everytime I go back in and look at it it shows not installed, so I install the drivers, all goes well, apparently, yet it always shows not installed afterwards. Frustrating.

by Former member

NT4 doesn't like USB printers in any way shape or form! You must connect these printers via parallel ports or ethernet. The cheapest way would be to fit an extra parallel port into the 2000 box if neither of the printers have an ethernet port.

by chipw

I know NT doesn't like locally connected USB anything. These are on another machine, win2000pro, and the NT boxes are connecting over the network to them. You are implying that NT also does not like USB printers on a seperate machine. Is this right?

by Former member

I know it sounds wierd: why should the client care how the printer is connected, but it must be something to do with the usb drivers. At least this has been my experience. Can you test from a Win 98 client? Can you connect one of the printers to theparallel port & reload the client driver? (I'm assuming the 8000N does have a parallel port!). Good luck & I would be very interested to hear if you can get the NT 4 clients to work as you're intending.

by chipw

I don't think that the problem is the usb drivers or connection. There are two usb printers connected to this particular box. One, HP8000N, the other Lexmark E412. The remote workstations print to the Lexmark just fine. The problem has to be the driver provided by HP for their printer, and I've talked to HP support and they insist it is the correct driver. I say bull to that.

by mangann

Have you tried the old 5si driver? Also, check MS Technet. You could also set up a permanent "Net Use" to the Printer like this to trick it: net use lpt1: \\mycomputer\hp8000a, then install the drivers locally. Maybe try setting up the printer via TCP/IP instead of Peer to Peer.

by chipw

I tried to add the HP8000N to that print server box again, using the HP5SI driver, but still get the same problem. When I print a test page, the queue show printing - restarting - printing - restarting continuously. I have tried the generic lazerjetdriver, 3 differant HP8000 drivers, the 5SI driver, and all result in the same problem. And this is on the local machine, win2000. Until this is rectified, I can't get a remote machine to print to it. We had this set up on the network but that set up had other problems. I am going to revisit the network set up though.

by chipw

We pulled out the pc that was used as the print server and replaced it with a differant one. The original had only usb ports, the new one has two parallel ports. Now all is fine, everyone is printing just fine.

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