Sharing a USB Scanner

I have an HP scanjet 5500c USB Scanner. Can anyone tell me if it is possible to share it across a network?

Nothing is mentioned in the instruction booklet or on the HP website.

Thanks

 

Dont know if you can share the scanner itself, but you could set up a shared folder, eg SCANS, right click on it for properties, and enable sharing for all users. Then set up the scanner so it sends the scans to the share folder. Check in the HP scan help files in your scanning software to see how to add a scan destination folder. I have a HP 4100 scanjet and it works for me.
cheers

 

Thanks, but I was hoping to set up the scanner so that others could use it from their workstations.

I wasn't sure if it could be done or not. I suspect it could only be done with multi-function printer/scanners.

 

Even some (most? all?) of the multi-function devices only act as shared printers for network connections and will scan from the PC that physically houses the device but not from the others.

 

That is what I suspected. I have a scanner attched to my office machine that someone else needs to use from time to time. I was hoping to be able to set it up so that they can put stuff in the feeder then go back to their own machine to do the work.

As it is, I have to vacate my desk for a while and go to the lavatory/shops/typing pool/pub etc.

Thanks for your help anyway.

 

If it's worth the effort and if everyone is running 2K or XP, you could set up so they could remote your PC and run the scan that way.

Maybe even if they are running 9X and you load the latest version of netmeeting. I know XP can remote a 9X PC that has a recent version of netmeeting. Not sure if the reverse is true though.

 

Thanks for the reply. We are both running 2000 so I suppose we could use terminal services, I hadn't given that any thought before now.

The scanner is only used occasionally for photographs, as all our black & white stuff goes through a fast bulk scanner, so next time my colleague tries to interupt my coffee-drinking with requests to scan. I will probably tell him to set up TS instead.

Thanks

 

Love to hear how it works. Haven't had occasion to try it and the theory is sound but always nice to hear real-world results.