Connect USB Scanner and USB Printer via WiFi for home PC's

AlterMind · 11 Dec 2020

Hello All !

I am seeking for your advice in order to setup a configuration at home so that I could provide the ability to

print on my old Samsung CLP-300 USB printer (no Wifi feature), and
scan from my old Canon Lide 60 USB scanner (no wifi)

from the several Win10 computers I have at home -- those are not easily physically connected to those devices but are on Wifi.

I was thinking on some Rasberry Pi device to connect both printer and scanner to, and make them available via its Wifi to the PC's I have at home. Is that a crazy idea or has it a reasonable chance to work ? The aspect that scares me off quite a bit is the setup of these peripherals on the RasPi especially as some tailored Linux (Raspbian ?) is recommended and I seriously doubt to be able to find the adequate Linux drivers for my rather old peripherals... And I didn't buy the RasPi yet !

I could also use an old Win7 laptop as shared device I guess, but that would require managing that PC, power on/off, etc.

Thanks for your advice !

dalchina · 11 Dec 2020

You should be able to do that if you share the devices across a network- i.e. connect them to one PC, which of course has to be on, configure networking and sharing, and share those devices so they are accessible from other PCs.

Paul Black · 11 Dec 2020

Hello @AlterMind,

dalchina said:

You should be able to do that if you share the devices across a network- i.e. connect them to one PC, which of course has to be on, configure networking and sharing, and share those devices so they are accessible from other PCs.

I agree with @dalchina.

These might be useful . . .

> Share a Printer in Windows 10
> Turn On or Off File and Printer Sharing in Windows 10

The same would be applicable for a scanner.

I hope this helps.

AlterMind · 11 Dec 2020

Thank you @Dalchina and @Paul -Black for your answers.

Yes of course, you are right, and it is definitely the simplest solution but that would require this PC to be powered-on all the time -- or accept the power-on time at each use of either of the peripherals. On the other hand I woudn't mind leaving a RasPi powered on.

By chance, would there be a nutshell version of Win10/Win7/WinXP running on a RasPi offering the Windows Sharing services ?
@+++

EDIT: besides, any computer I could permanently use as a hub for the printer and scanner is fairly old also... and runs Win 7, which might be some security risk.

dalchina · 12 Dec 2020

The PC in question could be in sleep mode.

Then you would remotely wake it- (wake on LAN) - that is, if you can't manage to walk to it and wake it yourself...
I've never done this myself, but here's a starter:
How To Remotely Wake Up Your Windows 10 PC

Need Help Setting Up "Wake On Lan"

It could even be shut down, but you'd have to wait for startup and set it to log in automatically:
View Wake Timers in Windows 10

AlterMind · 12 Dec 2020

dalchina said:

The PC in question could be in sleep mode.

That would indeed be much faster to be available compared to the standard power on 'till ready on this 2-core laptop.
The computer would be too far away from the router for WOL to be workable, I'm afraid.
Thanks a lot for these suggestions Dalchina, I'll try this and let know how things go