2 Win 7 machines sharing a printer

[Carol W.]

My husband (“PaulW” on this board) and I share an HP Laserjet 1020 printer. The printer is local to my machine on a USB port. He accesses it through a share.

The issue: Ever since PaulW upgraded to Windows 7 several weeks ago (I upgraded to Win 7 in October 2009), any time he queues something to be printed, my machine (the server for this printer) must be rebooted in order for his documents to print.

When we both were running Windows Vista, we did not have this issue. I have experimented with changing permissions and anything else I could find to change but to no avail. We have each reinstalled the printer too many times to count.

Of course, this is not a major issue but it is an annoyance. Any suggestions on resolving it would be greatly appreciated.

[DaveA]

Are either of these machines going to sleep or into hibernation?
If so turn the sleep or hibernation off and see if this helps.

Both of these can and have been issues at times with shares on a network.

[Carol W.]

DaveA,

Thanks for the reply.

They both do go into a sleep state periodically (no hibernation) but the issue occurs when they are both "awake".

Any other thoughts?

[DaveA]

BUT, had the one with the printer been to sleep since the last time it was used?

[Carol W.]

DaveA,

Just to clarify -- are you suggesting turning off the sleep (and hibernation) on my machine (the server for the printer) only or on both machines?

Thanks.

[DaveA]

Well, most of the time, the hosting machine does not wake up all the devices, including the NIC (Network card) or the printer and they can not be used.

But I were you, I would turn OFF the sleep on both machines and run it this for a while. If every things work ALL the time, then try turning on only one machine, and if you start having this problem again, try turning that one back on and turn the other Off. If you then have the same program again, that would tell us that they both need to sleep turned off.

I have not used sleep or hibernation for some time and have not had this issue, but others that I know who are using sleep, seem to have issues like from time to time.

[Carol W.]

Just thought I'd post an update on this issue.

PaulW got a new Win 7 64 bit computer this week. Our printer setup is still the same as it's been. The issue has disappeared. He can now print to the HPLaserjet 1020 without my machine needing to be rebooted.

I have no clue whatsoever what the issue was with his old Win 7 machine. The only thing that occurs to me is that his old machine was an upgrade from Vista to Win 7. The new machine is obviously a fresh Win 7 install.

[HansV]

Well, at least the problem is solved. Thanks for the update.