Setup printer- insanity

[askywalker]

I am going insane - my 15 years of IT experience is being humbled by this HP Photosmart printer and the stubborn Mac OS (tiger).

I browsed the workgroup trying to connect to it via an XP Pro computer. It is shared and used by the other 4 computers on this small LAN without trouble, but the Mac couldn't see it. No problem, I thought - I will plug it directly in since I just need a single print.

No driver for it listed in the default, so I download the OS X driver from HP's site. 45 MB download, run the installer - seems to be no problem. But the printer still isn't listed in the choice of printers. Tried rebooting (old windows trick...) Still nothing. When adding the printer via the Printer prefs it sees the Photosmart 7550 connected via USB, but asks me to set it up according to their list of choices - it isn't in their list still. I notice the 'Utilities' folder under Applications has an 'HP Printer Selector'. This utility reports 'This printer is not setup for printing in the Printer Setup Utility'. But the Launch Utility button takes me to some HP diagnostics that all work GREAT. But no where does it help me set up this printer in the Mac OS so that I can select it when printing documents.

So the HP software can communicate with the printer. The ink levels report fine, the test prints work. What is the secret Mac handshake to get the Mac OS to recognize it. It is listed in the Printer Browser, but it is asking me to select a driver. I can't find any appropriate driver. Nothing is listed, browsing around the file system hasn't uncovered anything. ARRRGGHHH!!!

I am going insane. So simple - I am sure I am just missing something obvious. I must be - Mac's can't be this hard to configure printers for can they? If only my printer was one of the ones listed in the 'installed printers'...

 

[QuarterSwede]

The thing that got me when doing this with my wife's old PC (now thankfully dead) was that Windows makes it insanely confusing. That aside, since you already have that side working, what I did to get everything talking was did a lot of research on Google. Trust me, there are a lot of sites that will walk you through the process. I'd tell you how to do it myself if I could remember how.

 

[emw]

Setting up personal HP printers has been problematic for me as well. I don't know why, but they're been amazingly frustrating.

I have an HP Photosmart C6100 that I print to using the built-in HP DeskJet 550C driver, which relies, apparently, on Gimp-Print to output from Mac OS X Tiger. But it works.

 

[askywalker]

Thanks for the tips. Swede - your suggestion got me to the Apple site that suggested making sure the 'Share Name' of the printer is below 15 characters- which at least got the 7550 listed. But it still wants me to select the appropriate printer on my Mac - which I HAVE INSTALLED, but it is not listing it.

I installed the OS 10 driver from HP, their software communicates perfectly with this printer - but the OS will not give me a choice that sounds anything like the Photosmart 7550.

I worked around this craziness today by looking at the list of pre-installed printers. Found someone that had one of these printers (HP Deskjet 990) and plugged it in. Instant goodness. Printed and done. But I can't use Joe's printer everytime I need to print from this Mac!

It is probably just as much HP's fault as it is Apple's - but it is crazy. When I unplug the printer the dialog box says it has lost the connection to the 990. It is rubbing my nose in it. If it has a connection, why can't I choose it when printing from any software! For the love of ink - please!!