One of the benefits that a network brings to a small business or a household full of computer users is the convenience of sharing one or more printers among all the network's users. Rather than carrying a copy of each file to the computer connected to the printer on a disk or a flash drive, you can simply click the Print command on your own computer and let the network send it to the printer automatically.
Even a very small network might include more than one printer. For example, you might use a black-and-white laser printer for routine documents and reports, a color inkjet or laser printer for fancy presentations and school projects, and a special-purpose color printer for digital photos. If you have more than one printer, you can select the best printer for each job. Each of these printers might be located in a different room, close to the person who uses it most often, or in a central room where they're equally accessible to all of your network's users.
You can connect a printer to a network in several ways: You can use an external printer server, a server built in to your printer, or an automatic switch connected directly to each printer, or you can connect through a computer. All of these methods accomplish the same thing: They send a formatted document or image to a printer that produces a paper copy. The best method for connecting a printer to your network depends on your budget, what's convenient for you, and the layout of your network.
An external network printer server is a device that connects to the network as a separate network node with an Ethernet port and provides either a parallel port connection or a USB connection to a stand-alone printer. Figure 14-1 shows a printer connected to a network through an external printer server.
Figure 14-1. An external printer server connects a printer to a network using a parallel port or a USB port.
Note
When you shop for a printer server, look for one that uses the same type of printer port as your printer. Most modern printers have USB ports, but older units with parallel ports are still common. If your printer has both USB and parallel ports, use the USB port.
External printer servers are a good choice when your network includes computers in more than one room and you have at least one spare port on the network hub or router. You can run an Ethernet cable to the server unit directly from the hub in the same room or from an unused wall outlet in another room. If you don't have enough Ethernet ports in the room where you want to place the printer server, connect the computer and the printer server to the network through an inexpensive Ethernet data switch, as shown in Figure 14-2.
Figure 14-2. If you don't have a spare network outlet for a printer server, use a small Ethernet data switch.
Note
When you install Ethernet cables for your home or small business network, consider the locations where you might want to install a printer. Run an extra Ethernet cable between that room and your network hub, and use a wall outlet plate (or surface mount box) with two or more RJ-45 jacks. Use a different color jack for each outlet to make it easier to identify them at a glance.
Adding a printer server to your network is similar to adding a computer, except that you'll have to configure the printer server remotely from a computer. The usual routine is to connect the server to the network and the printer to the server and then use a web-based configuration utility to set the server's network address and other options. Follow the instructions supplied with the server to load the printer driver.
Another advantage of using a printer connected directly to the network is that it operates independently of the other computers on the network. When a printer connects through a computer, that computer must be on all the time or you have to create a "public" account that the rest of the family or office can use to print. This setup is a lot less secure than printing through a server.
If your network already includes a Wi-Fi access point, you can use a Wi-Fi printer server to connect your printer to the network. The printer server should automatically detect the Wi-Fi signal from your access point and establish a two-way connection (data in and printer status out) between the printer and the computer that originated the print request. The Wi-Fi link should use all the same security tools (such as WPA encryption) as your other Wi-Fi connections.
A Wi-Fi printer shares the same wireless channel with other Wi-Fi links on your network, so a large document might slow down the network's performance, but slow performance is not likely to be an issue unless your network carries a lot of traffic. You can solve this problem by adding a second access point that uses a different channel and dedicating that access point to one or more printers.
Warning
When you set up the Wi-Fi link, make sure you connect the printer server to your own access point and not to a network owned by one of your neighbors.
A Wi-Fi printer server offers the following benefits:
The printer may be located anywhere within range of your Wi-Fi network signal.
You don't need a dedicated Ethernet port for the printer server.
If you need to move the printer, you don't have to rewire the network.
When you buy a new printer for your network, consider one that has a built-in network printer server along with the usual USB and/or parallel ports. The built-in printer server will perform like a printer connected through an external printer server, but it's easier to install because you don't have to connect additional cables.
Printers with built-in network interfaces are designed for small businesses and other workgroups that often produce a greater number of printed pages than a typical home network or a single user. They're often a bit more expensive than the combination of a low-end, stand-alone printer and a separate printer server device, because they're generally more durable printers with more and better features. But if your network's users print enough pages to justify a workgroup printer, the added cost will often pay for better performance.
When two or more of your computers are located in the same room or adjacent rooms, an automatic printer switch might be a less expensive alternative to a network printer server. As the name suggests, an automatic switch detects print requests from two or more input connectors and automatically forwards them to the printer, and the switch returns status information from the printer back to the computer that originated the request. When it receives more than one print request at the same time, the printer switch sends the first one to the printer and holds the other requests in a buffer until the first one has completed printing. As far as each computer attached to the switch is concerned, the printer is connected directly to that computer.
A printer switch is less practical when the computers on your network are in rooms that are far apart, because a cable must run from each computer to the switch.
The alternative to a printer server for a network that extends beyond more than one or two rooms is to connect the printer directly to one of the network computers and send print requests from all the other computers through that one.
This approach has several advantages:
You can use any printer connected to your computer.
You don't need a separate printer server device or a printer with a built-in network server.
You can locate a printer anywhere, not just where you have a free network port or outlet.
On a network where different users have different types of printers (such as laser and inkjet, color and black-and-white, or special formats for photos or large documents), using a computer as a printer server allows everyone to take advantage of each printer's features.
You don't need an additional port on the network hub or router.
On the other hand, this approach also has a few possible drawbacks:
The computer acting as a printer server must be turned on whenever anybody wants to print; this could be a security issue.
When the printer begins to print without warning, it could distract the person using the computer connected to the printer.
As other users come into the office or workspace where the printer is located to collect their print jobs, this can be yet another distraction for the operator of the computer acting as a printer server.
If your network also uses a dedicated file server, you can eliminate the security and distraction issues by using the same computer as your network's printer server. Or if you have an older computer collecting dust in a closet, you can use it as a stand-alone printer server (although you might have to add a network interface and maybe a USB port on plug-in expansion cards). However, the most common way to use a computer as a printer server is to connect the printer to an existing computer and direct print commands from all the other computers in the network to print through the server.
In Windows, setting up a printer server is a three-step process, described in the following sections.
Follow these steps to turn on printer sharing on your network interface:
From the Control Panel, select Network Connections. The Network Connections window will open.
Right-click Local Area Connection and select Properties from the pop-up menu. To share through your wireless connection, right-click Wireless Network Connection.
Confirm that the File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks option is active, as shown in Figure 14-3. If you don't see a checkmark next to this option, check the box to turn it on.
Figure 14-3. File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks must be active for you to share access to a printer.
Click OK to save your settings and close the Properties window.
Follow these steps to share a printer:
From the Control Panel, select Printers and Faxes (in Windows XP) or Printers (in Windows Vista). A window that contains links to all of the printers and virtual printers connected to this computer will open.
Right-click the printer you want to share with the network. A pop-up menu will appear.
Select Sharing from the pop-up menu. The Properties dialog for that printer will open with the Sharing tab visible, as shown in Figure 14-4.
In Windows XP, select the Share this printer option. In Vista, click the Change sharing options button, click Continue in the User Account Control window, and then select Share this printer.
In the Share name field, type a name that identifies this printer, such as Don's Printer.
In Windows Vista, the Sharing tab includes an option to render print jobs on client computers. If the other computers on the network use Windows XP or some other operating system, leave this option turned off. But if other Vista computers will be sending print jobs to this printer, you can speed up the printer's performance by checking this option.
After you set up the computer acting as a printer server to accept print jobs through your network, you must also add the server to each computer's list of printers. Follow these steps to add a network printer in Windows XP:
From the Control Panel, select Printers and Faxes. The Printers window will open.
Double-click Add a Printer to open the Add Printer Wizard. The Welcome screen will appear.
Click Next. The Local or Network Printer screen will appear.
Select the network printer option and click Next. The Browse for Printer screen shown in Figure 14-5 will appear, along with a list of shared printers connected to this network.
Figure 14-5. The Browse for Printer screen shows a list of all the shared printers connected to this network.
Select the name of the printer you want to use and click Next. The wizard will ask if you want to use this printer as the default.
If you want this computer to send print jobs to this printer as the default, click Yes. If you want it to appear in a menu as a secondary choice, click No.
Click Next. The wizard will confirm that you have added the printer to this computer's list.
Click Finish to complete the wizard and close the window. The name of the newly added printer should be visible in the Printers (or Printers and Faxes) window.
The process is similar in Windows Vista, but the Add a printer command is in the toolbar directly above the window, as shown in Figure 14-6.
Click Add a printer.
Click the Add a network, wireless or Bluetooth printer option. The wizard will display a list of all shared printers and printer servers connected to this network.
Select the printer you want to use from this computer and click Next.
The wizard will add this printer to your list.
