How many computers share a printer

The first step: Connect the printer to the host, turn on the printer power, go to the Printers and Faxes folder through the console's control Panel, right-click in the blank, select the Add Printer command, and open the Add Printer wizard window. Select "Connect to a local printer on this computer" and tick the "Automatically detect and install a Plug and Play printer" check box.

The second step: the host will be the new printer detection, will soon find the connected printer, according to the prompt to the printer driver CD included in the CD-ROM drive, after installing the printer driver, in the "Printers and Faxes" folder will appear the printer icon.

Step Three: Right-click on the newly installed printer icon, select the "Share" command, open the printer's properties dialog, switch to the "Share" tab, select "Share this printer" and fill in the "Share name" input box with the name you need to share, such as Compaqij, click "OK" button to complete the shared settings.

Tip: If you want other versions of the operating system on the LAN to share the host printer no longer need to find the driver, we can pre-select these different versions of the operating system driver installed on the host, just click the "Other Drivers" button, select the appropriate operating system version, click "OK" Can be installed after the installation.

2. Configure the network protocol

In order for the printer to be shared smoothly, we must install the "File and Printer Sharing protocol" on both the host and the client.

Right-click My Network Places on the desktop, select the Properties command, go to the Networks Connections folder, right-click the Local Area Connection icon, select the Properties command, if the "This connection uses the following items" list is not found in the "General" tab of the " File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks, you need to click the Install button, select Services in the Pop-up dialog box, click Add, select File and Printer sharing in the Select Network Service window, and then click OK to finish.

3. Installation and configuration of the client

Now that we've done all the work on the mainframe, we're going to configure the clients that need to share the printer. We assume that the client is also a Windows XP operating system. A print driver must be installed on every computer in the network that wants to use a shared printer.

First step: click start → settings → printers and faxes, start the Add Printer Wizard, and select the network printer option.

Step two: Several ways to add a network printer are available on the Specify Printer page. If you do not know the specific path of the network printer, you can select the Browse printer option to find a printer that is shared within the same workgroup in your LAN, a computer that has a printer installed, select a printer, click the OK button, and if you already know the network path of the printer, you can use the Universal Naming Convention (UNC) format enter the network path for the shared printer, such as "Jamescompaqij" (the user name of the host), and then click Next.

The third step: Then the system will you enter the printer name again, after the loss, click the "Next" button, and then press the "Done" button, if the host set up a shared password, here is required to enter a password. Finally, we can see that the icon for the shared printer has appeared in the Printers and Faxes folder of the client, and here our network printer is already installed.

4. Make the printer more secure

If only this is the case, illegal users in the local area network may be able to use shared printers, causing a "climb" in printing costs. In order to prevent illegal users from sharing the printer freely, it is necessary to restrict the use of the printer by setting account usage rights. By setting the security properties on the printer installed on the host, you specify that only legitimate accounts can use the shared printer.

First step: In the Printers and Faxes folder of the console, right-click the shared printer icon in it, select the Properties option from the context menu, and in the Shared printer properties settings box that opens, toggle the Security tab.

Step two: In the Option Settings page that opens later, select Everyone at the Name list and select Print as deny at the corresponding permissions list so that no user can access the shared printer at will.

The third step: then click the "Add" button, you can use the shared printer's legitimate account to import into the "name" list, and then select the imported legitimate account, and the corresponding print permission to "Allow".

Repeat the third step to import all other legitimate accounts that need to use the shared printer, then set their print permissions to allow, and then click the OK button.

Tip: If you can't find the Security tab, you can cancel using simple file sharing by selecting tools → folder options → view on the folder menu bar.