Help setting up wireless printing

I have read and cannot seem to find an answer, I have a pc running XP pro sp2 and a laptop running xp home sp2, I have a compusa brand 54g wireless rounter. connected to my pc are 4 printers(3 epson 1 HP), all usb. I cannot get my laptop to see these printers so that I may print wirelessly from them. I tried using network magic but it only saw the HP and it would not print, also it stated that my router was not supported. can someone give me a step by step on how to get printing. I am pretty good at most computer stuff except networking, it confuses the heck out of me. thanks

 

Network Printers

Peter,

Networking is "Vodoo Science" all in all no matter what they tell you.
And networking people are either too busy , too self important or really do not want to lose power and share information.
With the router it really should not matter wireless or non wireless once you are connected.
First of all not all routers are supported by Network Magic. They have a list for version 3. I jknow that for version 3 there was a list of supported routers. The Linksys WRT54G and most D-Link were supported. There is a brand new version ( 4 I believe) or Network Magic . They claim that it is supported by all routers except for some feautures. Regardless in the end if you cannot solve your problem you may try a router change.
Try upgrading to the newer version of network magic. Even then with all of your printers it may be network setup hell. The drivers for each printer of course have to be installed on the laptop. Are the printers attached to a print server of sorts or to the computers. Of course the computers with the printers have to be turned on. There is a setting for universal plug and play in the routers ( unp i think) you might try to turn it on although some peopel think that it has security issues.
This is a usefull site for router setup help:

http://www.portforward.com/

At the worst once you have the drivers installed for the various printers and you have used the Windows setup wizard to set up the printers ( or the printer setup disc) as network printers if nothing else works you verify that the printers work printing directly from your laptop plugged in by usb directly to the printer. Perhaps it is a printing issue with your laptop in setup- print spooler or another service turned off.

Hope this helps

 

it did not work, so far network magic blows, it has done nothing for me that windows cannot do. I bought a d-link print server at compusa this past weekend, it is a wired usb server, my question is if I install it on my desktop via my wireless router can I still access the printer from my laptop?

 

It is a very good question.
Once connected to the router via wireless or cable you would think it would not make much of a diffirence.
The print server would just be a device on the network.
Once in the network it should not matter whether the information is arriving via cables or wireless . It should all be the same.
Check to see if the router assigns the print server an ip address . Just curious.
Good question.

 

will update as soon as I do it, probably not till this weekend

 

installed wired print server and it works great, I can print wirelessly since the server is connected to my wireless router. thanks for all the help.