Hassle-free (or possibly wireless) printing?

[gutted]

I'm looking for a printer that I can connect up to either a print server or even maybe a hub or something so that it can be permanently online.

At the moment, our printer is connected to my girlfriends PC. We now use laptops most of the time, so it means when we need to print stuff we have to turn on another PC. It would be handy to have a printer which is always available...

I'm putting together a server soon, which can act as a print server - but it's going to be stashed away out of sight. Ideally I'd wat to connect a printer to it using wi-fi, so that the printer is easily accessible even though the print server will be locked away somewhere.

Never really loked into it before - anyone got any thoughts?

Cheers!
Dan.

[TechZ]

If youre looking to buy a new printer there are a few nowadays that come wireless enabled. If youre making a server, just connect the printer to it and share it, wirelessly.

[gutted]

Cheers duder.

I already did a bit of googling, and found a couple of wireless printers. Wasn't sure exactly how they work though. Do they have an ethernet port and a plug-in adapter or something? Or is the wireless device built-in to the printer (e.g. no adapter)?

I wasn't sure how you would configure the printer if it is 100% wireless. Maybe you need to assign it an IP adress or something, so that it can be seen on the network - but if so, how is this done: some sort of config tool, but how to connect to the config tool? Or possibly you wire it up through ethernet first (to configure it) and then unplug the ethernet - any ideas?

Same set of questions apply when I come to share the printer from the server (this is the ideal way forward for me). I'll connect printer wirelessly and then share it from the server - but I still need to get over the initial printer config so that the server can see the printer.

It's probably all very easy, and I'm missing something very simple. My apologies if so

[GreenGrime]

A friend from work is using a wireless print server and can now literally carry the inkjet around his pad whenever he needs to change locations.

He used a Linksys model.

http://www.linksys.com/products/grou...rid=33&scid=37

[gutted]

That looks pretty sweet - cheers duder!!

I wasn't sure if the printer needed to have an ethernet connection, but with the Linksys device it looks like I can use my existing printer. That would rock.

Fantastic - I shall be making a purchase pretty soon, I reckon :mrgreen:

[GreenGrime]

That guy I mentioned loves his.

He recommends you set it up last though, after all your WLAN security is set up to your liking.

[gutted]

Cheers for the tip. Although our network is already pretty sweet - only thing I should need to do is allow it to talk to the wireless access point (which resricts devices based on MAC address). After that is sorted, it should just plug in and go. Which, again, rocks.