Sorry - Windows 7 Printing through Shared Printer on XP

I've spent about an hour and 1/2 reviewing threads inside this forum and out. Any help would be greatly appreciated. There are the facts:

My desktop computer running Windows XP Service Pack 3 is attached to an HP 8250 printer. My laptop (a HP DV6704) was running Vista but yesterday I upgraded to Windows 7 Professional. All went well except I can't print from the laptop which connects wirelessly to my Linksys WRT-54G router.

The laptop on Windows 7 has the HP8250 printer and drivers on it. When I select print nothing happens, no error message or anything, and the documents just stay in the printing queue. I'm beginning to wonder if I may have screwed up a setting on my desktop running XP.

On XP I've gone to the control panel / printers and faxes / right clicked on the HP 8250 / checked sharing / clicked "Share this printer" and the share name is "Printer."

Honestly, I don't know what the heck to try. I have looked for guides, tried them, looked on HP's site, and I've gotten nowhere and probably took some steps backwards. The best solution I can come up at this point is replace the office computer running XP with a new computer running Windows 7 (it's to old to upgrade) but can't quite afford that and I say this half-jokingly as "I've heard" networking and printer is much easier between two Windows 7 computers.

Does anyone see where I may have screwed up above?

 

Just a a piece of information I failed to mention. I turned off the firewall on the desktop XP to make sure that wasn't blocking the printing. This did not help.

Also, I've tried to go through the guide linked at the end of this sentence numerous times because it seemed right on point - Share a Printer from XP to Windows 7. Unfortunately, I can't get past set 2 because I do NOT see the name of my XP computer in the list of computers when looking at network computers and devices on the Windows 7 laptop.

 

I assume the Desktop prints to the printer fine?

Can you verify that Link Layer Topology Discovery (LLTD) responder is listed and checked/enabled in the network connection properties of both machines network adapters. Is File/Printer sharing enabled on both machines? See attached images as guides.

And that guide you linked to is a very good one. A very simple/easy way to connect to a printer connected to another machine.

 

also make sure you have the vista or 7 driver installed on your laptop and have not forced the XP driver on. it will NOT work that way

 

Hi makaveli72, thank you for responding.

Yes, I can print fine from the desktop. I also plugged the printer USB cord into the laptop and was able to print that way.

I've verfied the LLTD settings and the boxes you marked are checked. In fact, all of the boxes are checked (including the Internet Protocol 6 box). And, my file and printer sharing box is check on the laptop as in your picture. On the desktop I didn't have a similar page, but I did share the printer on the desktop running XP by going to control panel, printers and enabling sharing and naming it "printer."

I do appreciate any help. I have resigned myself to simply not being able to print from the laptop so if it does get fixed, I'll be thrilled. Enjoying Windows 7 a lot though .

 

I searched for the Windows 7 drivers on the HP site and it said that Windows 7 would recognize the driver I needed (and HP didn't have one but that Windows 7 had one but not all extra printing options would be available).

If I recall correctly, when I plugged the HP 8250 into the laptop it found the driver and installed it so I don't think an XP driver could be install (I couldn't even use the HP disk as Windows 7 wouldn't allow me to).

 

A network print server, one that does the printer only, will cost you $30- on sale. This pretty much takes the XP/Win7/Vista interoperability problems out of the equation. Permanently.

You connect the printer to the print server and put the print server on the home network (wired or wireless) where everyone can see it. And you no longer have to make sure that the desktop machine is up and running to print. Some home routers (wired and wireless) print servers built in or you can go with a low-cost standalone device. Easy-peasy.

 

Have you checked in your performance logs on both machines to see if anything's getting logged regarding the print jobs you're trying to send. Also, have you checked the permissions on the printer share to make sure that the effective permissions set on it will actually permit the printer to be shared on your network?

 

I have the same general setup as you in my home. Old printer connected to desktop running XP. The desktop is connected to my router. Finally my laptop connected wirelessly. I have a simple home network or workgroup and everything works fine. My family have laptops using XP and Vista too and they can print wireless too. So I'm not sure if you have to create a homegroup first?

 

You could try setting a static I.P. on the XP box, then mapping the printer as a local printer and use a new tcp port.

This can bypass some of the problems. Some printers however just seem to dislike working in the way you want.