Should I upgrade to a Wireless Printer or buy a Print Server? December 31, 2009 09:54 by John Sollars
All of the major printer manufacturers are offering wireless printers at the top end of their product ranges and I guess the question is why would I want to pay the extra for the wireless functionality?.
The main advantage of upgrading is the the ability to add a printer to your computer without having to have a bit of wire tethering them together, and the other even bigger main advantage is that many computers can use your printer. This means that if you have a couple of laptops at home (and who doesn’t these days?) then you can sit comfortably on your sofa and be able to print without going to the printer and harnessing the two machines together, the other users (children in bedrooms – for instance) can also be connected and have the ability to print without dumping the file onto a USB Memory stick and taking it into the cold to print. You can also locate the printer anywhere in the home where it fits conveniently or alternatively out of the way where it can’t be easily seen
The big benefits of using Wireless Printing are:
- It allows printers to be conveniently located anywhere within wireless network range, not tied to the location of the computers
- Does not require a computer to be always turned on in order to print
- Does not require a computer to manage all print jobs, that slow down its performance
- Allows administrators to change computer names and other settings without having to reconfigure the network print settings
The other option you have is to spend around £40 and buy a print server. If your current printer is doing all you need, and you don’t feel inclined to boost the printer manufacturers profits, but would like the benefits associated with a wireless printer then a print server could be for you. These are easily available from most of the online hardware retailers manufactured by people like Netgear, D-Link and Linksys. The modern ones will normally have a USB 2.0 connection to your printer and up to 4 Ethernet ports as well as the wireless, enabling you to connect to both wired and wireless networks.
The main advantage for using the print server is you don’t have to connect your printer to a computer and share the printer on that computer (printer shared computer). What you do is connect your printer to the print server and the print server into your home/office network (if you have one).
The print server manages the print job requests from computers and sends them to the printer with much faster speed than a printer shared computer. Utilising the USB 2.0 connection this is then passed to your printer to execute the job.
The only other thing to be aware of is that you need to install the printer driver on the machine that you are printing from. From bitter personal experience the most Techno-Stress I have is from (in this particular order) Emails, Printers and networks – so be careful!
7 Responses to “Should I upgrade to a Wireless Printer or buy a Print Server?”
December 31, 2009 10:01
More stress from emails than anything else?! You have obviously never had a proper networking stress!
How reliable are wireless performance on printers nowadays? Friend of mine had issues connecting printers to the new N series routers, and had to disable the N signal to get it to work, which is obviously not ideal for signal strength and speed. Losing the cable is great and all, but if it means I have to push my laptop right up to the face of the printer to get the signal to find it, I think I'd rather get a house-sized connection cable!
January 07, 2010 10:41
What functionality do you get via the printer server - an important aspect? I have a Wireless router with printer port, allowing me to print wirelessly. It's about 18 months old. However, it only allows basic functionality, additional options such as duplex, multi-page printing etc are unavailable.
January 07, 2010 10:42
I would not recommend having a wireless printer if you run a business.
I have had a Lexmark x 4850 for over a year, and the main problem is that wirelessly it is not reliable. The signal strength varies and the printer crashes often.I have had no end of stress with it. Also printing from other computers was much worse.
Having a business a reliable printer is essential. I ended up buying another make printer which is not wireless, and have now connected the lexmark with a cable to my computer-(I still get occasional problems with it as it seems to think it should be a wireless printer. The previous non wireless Lexmark I had was marvellous and lasted a number of years -never letting me down.
January 15, 2010 08:16
Thanks Again...
I saw this really good post today....
January 15, 2010 16:20
Thanks for this information - it's all really good stuff but can be quite tricky to find out.
August 17, 2010 12:24
I was searching for a great wirless printer, after reading your article I finally found a good one. So thx for taking the time and writng about great wirless printers.
December 20, 2010 00:00
There are still a lot of problems with regards to the whole wireless printer set up. But with the proper guide that corresponds to your model type as well as operating system, setting up static I.P. can be a breeze. New models are definitely recommended for faster set up, less errors and better printing.