Setting up Shared Printers

A home network allows more than one computer to share the same connection to the internet. The typical setup includes some sort of broadband connection to the internet, a router (maybe wireless) and more than one computer. Usually your broadband provider (cable company, Verizon, etc.) will configure the basics for you such that all of your computers can connect to the internet, but there is so much more you can do with a home network – such as sharing printers. It can be a life saver when your kid has an assignment due and their printer runs out of ink.

There are essentially two ways to share a home printer. One way is to share a printer that is connected to one of the computers on your network the other is a printer that has a network connection built in that connects directly to your network without the need to connect through a computer. The disadvantage of the first method is that the host computer must be left on all the time to allow other computers on the network to print, while with the second method, there is no host computer, so if the printer is on, you can print. When buying a new printer, you might want to consider one that is network capable – it might be worth the additional cost. But if you already have a direct-connect printer, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t share it with the rest of your network.

Sharing a directly connected printer is not that difficult. With Windows Vista and Windows 7 (Vista/7) there are a couple of extra steps as a result of the operating system’s increased security requirements that should be accomplished first.

With Vista/7 open the Network and Sharing Center (Open Control Panel – Network and Inernet – Network and Sharing Center)

Make sure your setup agrees with the highlighted items above. If your network is listed as a “Public” network – click on customize and change it to “Private”. Turning on printer sharing is self-explanatory, and you don’t want to have to enter a password every time you access the printer, so turn off password protected sharing.

At this point, sharing the printer is easy. On the computer that will be hosting the printer, from the Control Panel open Printers (Control Panel – Hardware and Sound – Printers). If the printer is not already installed, you must install it first. Right click the printer you want to share and select “Sharing”. On the resulting “Sharing” tab select “Share this printer” and enter a Share name. If you enter a name with spaces in it you may get a warning that the printer name is not compatible with earlier versions of Windows. You can safely ignore that question. Practically no one is using such an old version of Windows (or DOS!) that would require a ‘space-less’ printer name.

Now all that is left is to install the printer on the other computers around the house. From Control Panel – Printers, click on add a printer. Select Add a Network Printer. If you are lucky, it will find the shared printer and install the necessary drivers. If not, then you need some advanced troubleshooting. More on that later.

Oh, and Happy New Year!