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ACADEMIC COMPUTING and COMMUNICATIONS CENTER | ||||||||
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Connecting Your Printer to the Network | ||||||||||||||
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This document describes some of the possible ways to connect your printer to a
network.
Any networked printer must be connected to the network somehow. Here are the most common ways to network a printer at UIC: |
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| Stand-alone Ethernet Print Server. | ||||||||||||||
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There are many such print server products on the market. The model most commonly used at UIC is the M202 series from Microplex. These cost a few hundred dollars, but they can be configured for 2 printers. They are very small, about the size of a cigar box. These handle a large amount of print traffic, so they work well in a lab situation. These also work well for older printers because they use normal printer parallel cables, which means that the printer does not have to be 'network ready' itself; any printer will work. In addition, you will need a network connection for the server, which can be set up for you by our networks group. You can have the ACCC order you the latest model of the server and install and configure it for you. In addition to the cost of the server, the charge is $50. Send an email note to lan@uic.edu if you would like this option. |
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| Printer Ethernet cards. | ||||||||||||||
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Many printers now include Ethernet cards, or at least have the ability to add them on. For example, Hewlett Packard (HP) printers have optional JetDirect cards for their printers. Configure the card according to directions that come with it, then plug it into a network connection, which can be set up for you by our networks group. The ACCC has experience with HP-JetDirect cards and can help you configure them. Send an email note to lan@uic.edu if you would like this option. |
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| Use an existing PC as a print server. | ||||||||||||||
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Finally, if you don't want to buy a stand-alone print server, you can use an older PC that has a network connection for the job. Plug the printer into the PC acting as a print server, then connect to the printer through that PC from the rest of your office. It is not recommend that you use this option on a PC that is being used by someone; printing will inevitably be disturbed in such a scenario There are many options for choosing the software to run on the server PC; it will depend on how you want the other PCs or Macs to connect to the printer. More details are provided in other documents; you can access them by clicking on the links in the blue boxes at the top and bottom of this page. |
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| Network Printing | Previous: 0. Contents | Next: 2. Microsoft Networking |
| 2004-10-29 CSO |
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