Frustrating printer problem

[GH85Carrera]

I have what should be a very simple problem with sharing my home printer. It is an old HP Laser Jet 1160 hooked to the printer port with a standard printer cable to my home computer.

I am running XP and I am trying to share the printer with my Ubuntu 11.04 netbook and my iPhone4 & iPad. All of the devices can “see” the printer shared on the XP machine but they all need a username and password to print. The home XP computer only has one “user” and no log-on passwords. I don’t think I ever setup a username-password for the printer. If I did I can’t find any place to change it or delete it. I can’t find anything in the printer setup on XP that mentions user name and password.

I don’t think it is a wireless network problem, all the devices can get on the network just fine. I even named the printer something different and all the devices see that name, but the username-password stops every device.

Any suggestions?

Where do I find the username-password set up for printers in XP? I have looked but I have yet to find it.

[id10t]

Been a long time since I've done windows stuff, but you need to create a user (or use the same username you use to log into XP). Personally I'd find a router that also has a printer port on it and share it via the router, then your computer doesn't have to be on for the other devices to print

[Mericet]

It's been a while since I had to deal with an issue like this, but I think the username/password is the login used for your XP computer. If you do not have a password, leave that field blank.

[GH85Carrera]

There is no log on username and password for the computer. There never has been. Just hitting enter does not work.

[widebody911]

Right click My Computer -> Manage -> Local Users and Groups -> Users

What do you see?

[stomachmonkey]

When you set up print sharing on the host you can opt to allow "guest" access.

[ODDJOB UNO]

a 33rd mag should do the trick.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by widebody911

Right click My Computer -> Manage -> Local Users and Groups -> Users

What do you see?

[widebody911]

Ok, make sure the "Administrator" passwd matches for all machines, and that the printer is shared for everyone, and that you're all in the same workgroup

[GH85Carrera]

There is no password on the XP machine. The printer is shared.

When I tell the other machines to print it pops up wanting a username-password. Argghhh

I am guessing this is going to be a registry edit style fix.

[widebody911]

Or re-run the sharing wizard

[id10t]

For the prompt that pops up, enter "user" (w/o quotes) for the user name, leave password blank

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by id10t

For the prompt that pops up, enter "user" (w/o quotes) for the user name, leave password blank

That is a good idea.

I tried it and still no joy.

I tried

user

User

USER

Still no print.

[Head416]

Try "computername\user" and a blank password. You can get your computer name by right-clicking on My Computer and clicking on Properties. Then click on the Computer Name tab.

Also, try right-clicking on the shared printer and look at the Security tab. Is "Everyone" allowed to print?

[Mericet]

If you use the "Log Off" (Start->Log Off; Log Off) function on your XP machine, what users show on that screen?

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by Mericet

If you use the "Log Off" (Start->Log Off; Log Off) function on your XP machine, what users show on that screen?

Only:

user

[Head416]

Guest and Administrator exist by default. User was created when XP was installed. No password was entered, so you don't have to enter one to logon. But as far as XP is concerned when you use your computer you are logging on as "User".

[Mericet]

I am fairly sure that this is a network permissions issue. That is why you can see the printer but it prompts you for a logon when you try to use it. When trying to print from your Ubuntu netbook, did you try the username and password for that?

[Head416]

This is the Windows XP machine requiring credentials before it allows another device to access its shared printer. The XP machine will have no awareness of the credentials on the other machines.

That's also why I suggest including the "computername\" before the ID. "User" on the XP machine and "User" on the Ubuntu machine are two totally different accounts - like two guys named Bob.

Although, that just made me think of another possibility... sometimes if you create an account on two different machines with the same name and same password it will work. It's kind of a trick, but it might work. This is like having two guys named Bob Smith and people getting confused about which one they're talking about.

[GH85Carrera]

HAPPY DANCE TIME

My final solution was to set up a new user.

I made a new user called abc and the password of abc.

It prints right from my iPhone to a Windows networked printer. Ubuntu is happy with that as well. YEA!

Thanks for the help guys.