How do I connect a USB printer through a router?

geowal19

geowal19

geowal19

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I have a printer connected to my desktop and want to print with my laptop that is connected to the router wirelessly. The desktop is wired. what is the easiest way to print from my laptop can I get a USB to CAT5 converter and connect the printer to the router? Thanks
 
You can get USB print servers that connect to the network either wirelessly or via ethernet cable and a printer on the other end but they are flakey and dont always work. Think Linksys do a good one though.

You can share the printer on your desktop so your laptop can print to it but your desktop will have to be on. THis is probably the easiest option.

Best and most costley solution is to buy a printer with network connectivity!
 
J.B said:
You can get USB print servers that connect to the network either wirelessly or via ethernet cable and a printer on the other end but they are flakey and dont always work. Think Linksys do a good one though.
Click to expand...

I would suggest one of these, but agree on the fact that they are pretty flaky. We used to use them at work, but deicded in the end to ditch them for a proper networked printer.

To be honest depending on how expensive your printer was (or wasn't) you may want to consider a proper networked printer.

The cheapest solution would be to network it using your desktop, but this would need to be turned on for it to work. Depending on the setup this could turn out to be massively annoying.
 
You could also use a NAS for printer sharing as well as the use as a network drive. Not sure how reliable this system is but must be better than the USB --> ethernet doohikeys.
 
Just right click share like you would a directory. You may need to add file \ print sharing to you network card and \ or mess with firewall settings dependsing on software and OS.
 
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