Wireless printer on a public (university) wifi?

I bough a brother 2170w, and I was wondering if there was a way to make it so only my laptop will be able to use the printer. I don't really want to wake up in the middle of the night to someone printing stuff on my printer.

 

If you don't share your printer or files (which you should never do on a public network), then people can't access your stuff. If you have Vista, you should choose "public" as the type of network, which will disable file/printer sharing.

 

I was about to say I don't see any way to limit the printing by computer in the manual, but stumbling around in the deep settings of my printer, I may have found a way but it might be....tricky.

Just so we are clear, you already connected your printer to the University Network, and it received an ip address and it is functioning already?

Did you give it a static ip address or did it get a dnamic ip address?

Without doing anything elaborate, in order to print someone does have to install the driver first. So they have to do that before accidentally printing. They also need to know the printer exists--pretty sure that network discovery is off by default on this printer so it shouldn't just "show up".

When you set it up, how did you set it up (method)--manually or by using the provided software disk?

When you set up your computer, how do YOU get an ip address?

Some Brother printers have the ability to filter print requests by ip address. So, you can set the printer to ONLY accept print jobs from a specific machine--but only by ip address.

Your IP address may change each time you join the network if you use DHCP, depending on lease time set by your network admin.

 

Keg--his is a WIRELESS network printer. He is not hooked directly to the printer so sharing does not apply

 

And since when does having a Wireless anything NOT let you share? Where have you been living the past few years?

 

I don't know how to respond to this--normally, I don't like to point out people's ignorance, but given your tone....

Keg simply read the post wrong--you on the other hand don't seem to have a clue what a WIRELESS NETWORK printer is.

A wireless network printer is a separate node on a network, just like a computer is a separate node. It can print completely independent of a computer. You don't "share" a network printer, you connect to it like you would connect to a server (technically speaking, a wireless network printer or any network printer is a printer with a print server included).

This is different from a printer on a network hooked up to a dedicated printer server or workstation.

Now, a completely ignorent person (in a more harsh moment I might add, such as yourself) might connect to a wireless network printer and then share it so anyone who wants to use it can connect to his computer first and then send print jobs to your computer, which then initiates the print job, but only an idiot would do that when any computer on the network can print directly to the network printer.

Now, you can also set up this printer in an adhoc network and then share it with other computers on his adhoc network--again, idiotic since any member of the adhoc network can connect directly to the printer)--but given that he wants to enjoy the network resources of the University PUBLIC NETWORK he would be doing a lot of connecting and disconnecting.

Since he already connected his NETWORK printer to the PUBLIC NETWORK, he asked how he could prevent others from connecting and I pointed him toward a possibility--albeit with caveats.

You, on the other hand, haven't contributed anything to the conversation other than to try and insult me, but unwittingly showing everyone you don't know what you are talking about.

Now, maybe, you misread the question, too, (in a debate, this is called your "out" and it allows you to save face--my advice, take it) but if that is the case, you really ought to read carefully before attempting to correct someone who knows quite a bit about this stuff.

So, I can only ask

 

I suggest you switch off your printer when you not using it mate!

 

Whoops. Sometimes I just don't slow down before I post!

To the OP: I also haven't found any configuration options that allow you to password protect access to the printer (you can and should change the default admin password!). I think your best bet is to connect via USB and disable the wireless capability. Instructions are found in the Network User's Guide, available from brother.com.

 

And that is probably the best solution of all!

 

Is there a password protection in the printer's configuration somewhere?

 

the only password protection is to prevent changing the configuration--not allow or disallow access to printing

 

I read about a "user" account and an "admin" account, but I didn't find anything else in the network user's guide that even explained what the "user" account is for.

 

Haha good one. Anyway just the fact that only you know the printer exists should be enough. If you want to be safe dont leave too much paper in the printer. I highly doubt anyone will accidentally print to your printer.

 

Actually, lix, with Vista network discovery...people could "find it"

The feature may or may not be disabled out of the box.

And yeah, Keg, the whole USER account thing is puzzling to me, too. Not much of a point to it other than to look at the configuration settings--unless I am missing something

 

I think the OP should call Brother and ask some questions, since the manuals don't seem to get into depth about the settings.