HP-C7200, Wireless Routers, Scanning - and Operator Headspace

[Dan]

Sheesh! One little flaw in the logic ... and the whole operation goes from SNAFU to FUBAR ... and trust me, it takes a while to walk back from a place like that. <....>

So I offer this to anyone else who might end up tagged off base the same way I was this morning.

The setting:
New laptop ... (With all the bells and whistles!) Yet ... it won't play well with the old Netgear wireless router. Kinda get's AR about the one at my "other" office, too. So ... it's under warranty, and after a lot of high blood pressure, three weeks of phone calls to downtown who-knows-where in India, I get a drop shipped wireless card. (Therein lies a story -- which I'll keep for a different occassion.) That pretty much does it. Now the wireless plays very well with everything. But ... in the meantime, I had replaced the old Netgear router. The excuses reasons were many and -- I think -- quite good.

It (the old router) was a Netgear WGR-614 b/g wireless and 10/100 Fast ethernet, and still good, but the new laptop doesn't really like it. They'll work together now, but they really ain't friends. So, now both laptops in the house are b/g/n, and both desktops are 10/100/1000. Ergo, a new Linksys E3200 High Performance Dual-Band N Router is in order. (My only regret is that it isn't equipped with a switch to shut down the radio.)

Which opens up a couple of other doors I'd neglected to explore earlier. The first being utilizing the HP C7200 wireless printing capability. Pretty neat stuff, Maynard! No more CAT5 tether, and no draping blue wires adding to the office décor. (Which pleased the War Department no end!)

But ... (and there's always a but) scanning was an issue. So I decided to fix that. I loaded up the HPLIP GUI and did my level best for almost twenty minutes scratching my head trying to get the "wireless" function to even detect the printer/scanner/fax. (As a matter of fact, I never could get that to work.) Right up until I realized I didn't have to. The silly router was automagically taking care of those details already. Somehow, in all that, I had forgotten that there wasn't a wireless card installed on this particular desktop box. <....>

So the advice I offer is this:

The solution:
If you've already set your All-In-One printer up as a network printer on either CAT5, or wireless through a wireless router, just ignore the flippin' setup wizard in the HPLIP control panel. It'll only lead to silly assumptions and wasted grumbles. Just continue to let the router do all the work, and sit back and watch the pretty blinking lights. <....>