obligatory obscure reference

I’ve had a HP Business Inkjet 1200n for 4-5 years now and it’s been a great printer. For only $250 I got duplex, ethernet, color and dual trays.

Apple’s OSX, however has not played well with it. Starting with 10.4, there’s been a low-level problem in CUPS (the free software Apple uses for printing and has since “bought”) on OSX/Intel that I’ve never been able to diagnose and Apple hasn’t cared to fix it either. So, to print from our MacBooks we’ve had to use a G5 as a print server. Not the end of the world, but annoying.

I finally upgraded everything to 10.5. and whammo, I can no longer print from the G5. After a few hours of mucking around, I discovered what you could either call the “right way” or a “workaround”. It’s certainly not something you’d think to try, but it works for me:

1. Go into Printer and Fax preferences and delete any existing HP printer using the “-” button.
2. Start adding a printer using the “+” button.
3. Pick “More Printers” and wait for it to grind.
4. Pick “HP IP Printing” from the scoll bar.
5. Pick “Manual”
6. Enter the printer’s IP address and click “Add”.

That should bring up a dialog correctly identifying your HP printer.

[tags]HP Business Inkjet 1200, OSX, printer[/tags]