Printing from laptop had timing issues.

I am having an issue with sending documents from my Dell Studio 1535 laptop running WIN 10 to my HP Officejet Pro8500 A909g. Since the laptop and Century link modem are in the same room (most of the time) the laptop is Ethernet connected. The printer is USB connected to my Dell desktop, running WIN 7, and shared. When I send a document from my laptop to the printer it may take 3 to 5 minutes before it starts printing (a one page or ten-page document). This has going on for some time and I have put up with it.

I decided to investigate what was going on. I removed the printer from the laptop and re-installed… no change. I removed the printer for the laptop again. I then removed the printer from the desktop and rebooted. I let the install go out to the internet for drivers… that took a while. I tested the printer and all was OK. I then installed the printer on the laptop and nothing changed. Still took 3 to 5 minutes to print. I did notice all the printer icons in the control panel were the same with the exception of the Fax and HP 4000 see attachment.
Just before I started writing this I disconnected the Ethernet cable and tested the printer. Low and behold the document started printing immediately.

Before I posted this I uninstalled the printer from the laptop re-booted and removed the Ethernet cable from the laptop then installed the printer. The install went fine. I tried a test page and it printed almost immediately. I installed the Ethernet cable tried a test page and now all works fine… it printed immediately.
Now I want to know what happened!
John

Can't say what happened since it is fixed but I use an HP Officejet Pro 8600 and found it quite reliable when connected to my Router by Ethernet cable. I can print to it using Wi-Fi Networking from Windows, Mac OS X and Linux computers.
A page that may help although Win10 is not mentioned:
Setting Up the Printer for a Wired or Wireless Network for the HP Officejet Pro 8500 All-in-One Printer Series | HP® Customer Support

This document explains how to install the print drivers and other software for your HP printer to use it on a wireless or wired (Ethernet) network. The wireless setup instructions are specific to a wireless network that uses an access point (infrastructure network). This document also explains how to change your printer from a USB install to a network install.

A major advantage of the wired setup is that no particular computer actually has to be running versus using the USB connection.

Berton do you have any idea why the icons are all the same? Also, I forgot to mention that when searching for a printer on the laptop it only found 'Direct-07-HP Officejet 5740' and I have never had that type of printer attached to this laptop... at least that I know of. I had to cleck 'not found' and have it do a search from on 'VICTORIA-PC' then it found the 8500, not sure what that was about.
Thanks for the link it had some good information in it.

John

JohnM72 said:

Berton do you have any idea why the icons are all the same? Also, I forgot to mention that when searching for a printer on the laptop it only found 'Direct-07-HP Officejet 5740' and I have never had that type of printer attached to this laptop... at least that I know of. I had to cleck 'not found' and have it do a search from on 'VICTORIA-PC' then it found the 8500, not sure what that was about.
Thanks for the link it had some good information in it.

John

You're welcome. As for the Officejet 5740, it's quite possible it sees that Wi-Fi printer in close proximity, maybe a neighbor? Most times a Wi-Fi list of available Routers will pick up a number of them close by, right now my MacBook Pro is picking up 6, all of which is to emphasis having the Router secured with a password.

Well that fix did not last long. This past Sunday I tried to print and the same thing happened. This time it took about 5 minutes to print. Well today I decided to do a little investigating/testing.
I disconnected the Ethernet cable to see what would happen. I printed a test page from the laptop and the response was “…to start the spooler on the desktop...” ???
I rebooted the laptop without the Ethernet cable connected. The icons in the ‘Devices and Printers’ were greyed out. I did however print a test page and 5 minutes it came out.
I reconnected the Ethernet cable, removed the printer and rebooted.
I reinstalled the printer and when I went to print the test page the Devices and Printers came back with ‘not responding’. When I close the control panel the control panel shut down.
Again I tried to print a test page. After I click the print test page then check to see what is printing and the status is spooling even after 90 seconds.
Ideas?
John