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Printing with Windows 9x clients

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5 replies

by shizmoney

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I just changed servers from Windows NT server to Windows 2000 Server. The problem is that all of my Windows 9x clients cannot see some of the network printers. All of our printers are HP 4000 series and 5000 series, it sees some of them but not all particulay the one that they use to print to. I tried forceing the install by puting the path in using the \\server name\printer name and using\\the servers ip address\printers ip address still nothing.

Someon please help.
Thanx

5 replies

by shortbus

Well, first of all, make sure you have additional Win9x compatable drivers installed on the Win2k Print Servers. You're Win9x clients will not be able to connect and use a printer that which a driver is not available.

In addition to that, ensurethat the Win9x clients have appropriate permissions to use the printers located on the Windows 2000 Servers.

Also, have you altered the Win9x machines to point to the correct DNS server for your domain? If not, do so. DNS is the primary name resolution service for Windows 2000.

You may also wish to install and configure WINS on one of the Win2K servers to allow the Win9x pc's to use their "native" protocol, NetBIOS.

Hope this helps,

Bus

by huckleberryhound

Is this an Active Directory domain and how long are the print queue names? If the print queue names are longer than 12 characters the Windows 9x clients will not be able to see the share.

The solution is to either rename the print queue using a name this is shorter than 13 characters or install the Active Directory client (located on the W2K server CD) on the Windows 9x workstations. Once the AD client is installed then you can have the user do a query against the global catalog to find the printer they want. You do this by clicking START ... FIND ... PRINTERS ... FIND NOW
Then double click on the printer and it will be installed automatically.

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