Sharing printers between a mac and 2 PCs

heppy23

I've got a small home network - a dual core mac, a PC and then the laptop comes to visit (I work from home two days a week).

I've got a laser printer and an inkjet (for photos).

I often need to print work stuff out.

At the moment the printers are both connected to the mac but I am struggling to "find" them with the PC or the laptop.

Am I better off attaching them to the PC then letting the mac and the laptop find them that way?

almillar

I'll guess that you're using OSX.5 (Leopard) on the Mac. Sharing is disabled by default for security, you need to go in and enable Printer Sharing, inside System Preferences- Sharing. Best to restart all computers after that too. You may also need to enable Windows sharing for the Windows computers to see the printer but I'm not sure...
Alan

timbim_2

What sort of network have you got? If you have a router (Which I assume you must as you have 3 computers), you can buy a two port printserver which plugs into the router via ethernet, and can be acessed by all computers, even if the mac's off.

Bob63

At home I have a desktop PC (soon to be retired!!) running XP which has an inkjet and laser printer shared using standard windows printer sharing. I have a Macbook Pro and my daughter has a Macbook. Both of these use SMB to connect to shared disks and the printers on the PC. This works consistently and was a breeze to install the Windows printers on the Macs (System Preferences --> Printers & Faxes --> Windows - then just browse the network and choose the shared printer on the PC)

Doing it the other way i.e. sharing from the Mac you would probably be better to install Bonjour on the PC (free download from apple.com) so that it can use the native Apple printer sharing protocols. I haven't done this so can't tell you how well it works.

Mike

heppy23

timbim wrote: »

What sort of network have you got? If you have a router (Which I assume you must as you have 3 computers), you can buy a two port printserver which plugs into the router via ethernet, and can be acessed by all computers, even if the mac's off.

I've got a router with a wireless access point.
I did think about a printserver actually, I set one up at work and it's been bulletproof.

The PC might not be around for a lot longer so maybe a print server is the way to go for the future.

heppy23

almillar wrote: »

I'll guess that you're using OSX.5 (Leopard) on the Mac. Sharing is disabled by default for security, you need to go in and enable Printer Sharing, inside System Preferences- Sharing. Best to restart all computers after that too. You may also need to enable Windows sharing for the Windows computers to see the printer but I'm not sure...
Alan

It's the OS before the one that came our recently (if that makes sense) - the mac is a year old. I will have a play with those settings. I'm happy to leave the mac running the printers as long as the windows computers can find them.

timbim_2

In my opinion, a printserver is the way to go, as it does not rely on any computer. Thus if (heaven forbid!) the mac were to break down, or not be switched on, there would be no problem. It also reduces hassle when the configuration of the network is changed.