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2 Messages

Thursday, August 14th, 2014 6:00 AM

Issues with wireless printer

Hello,  I'm hoping someone can help me here.

 

We're a small office with a CISCO dual band modem/wireless router supplied by Comcast.  We also have an HP 6700 wireless printer set up.

 

Before 2 weeks ago, this same PC/printer setup was on a FIOS modem/router network with no issues for months, able to scan the network, see each other and connect.

 

 

Initial setup was fine, if not entirely straightforward.  The printer recognized the 2.4Gz network, got connected, got an IP something like 10.1.10.206.  The computer couldn't scan the network to find the printer, but happily installed it via IP address.

 

Move ahead 3 or 4 days, and try to print with no luck.  Turns out the network has reassigned the printer's IP address to 10.0.0.143.  According to the printer, still on the correct network.  My computer is also on that same network band.  I spent hours trying to get the PC to recognize the printer in any way possible, or to get the printer a new IP adress.  No luck.  The PC just would say that there's nothing found at that IP.  Gave it up for a bad job and decided to come back to it later.

 

Next day, all is well.  The network reassigned the printer the 10.1.10.206 IP.

Now, 3-4 days later again, we're back at 10.0.0.143.

 

As this printer/scanner is our only means of faxing/scanning documents, and we're a law office with a mandate to e-file, I am quite anxious to figure out how to work around this.  I don't even mind if I have to update my software all the time to recognize the printer... But I don't even have a clue what's going on.  

 

I'm as sys-admin as it gets around here, but not very savvy.  My gut tells me this 10.0.0.143 IP is a strange one.

Any ideas?  I'd love to be able to configure the router to always give my printer the same internal IP.

 

I see now in an ealier post how to login to the router.  Also, I see that although the printer believes it's connected, it is not listed in my router as being connected.  Any ideas?

Gold Problem solver

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610 Messages

10 years ago

what model of router did Comcast give you? in general, it is possible to set whats called a "DHCP reservation" on the router, which will ensure that the printer will always have the same IP. If you tell us your router we can give you more detailed instructions on how to enable this.

Alternatively, you could configure the printer with a static IP. This is generally done by navigating the menu on the front or top of the printer, or optionally via software installed on a computer. The actual method varies from printer to printer.

New Contributor

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2 Messages

10 years ago

Thank you!

 

Once I was in the router admin pages and knew what to look for I was able to reserve the IP that worked and link it with the MAC address of the printer.   It all seems to be working now.

Gold Problem solver

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610 Messages

10 years ago

great!