Printing Question for a dorm room

[Absberg2k]

My daughter will be starting college in the fall. She has a Macbook and her roommate will have a PC. The university offers wireless access in the dorms so they can both log on independently with no problems.

They will need a printer I would assume. My question is: What is the easiest and most reliable solution for them to share one printer? I assume we can't add the printer to the university's network. Should they just connect via usb cable when they want to print? Should they set up a separate wireless network in their room to share the printer? I'm sure they are really going to want to be able to print wirelessly. Should I send her to school with a Time Capsule for backup and hook the printer up to it?

I'm just not sure how to make this work for both of them.

 

[alphaod]

It all depends on how the university network is set up; personally I set my printer up on the network and everyone can print to it, but I just give the IP address to people that I allow.

Yes I guess your daughter could create a subnet with just your roommate's computer and her's with the printer, but I find that a lot more tedious.