Avoid certain characters in networked printer names

Apr 12, '06 06:26:00AM

Contributed by: Anonymous

I recently had to purchase a new printer, and so I took time to choose one to network. I chose an HP Deskjet 5940. The box said it was compatable with both OS X and XP, and the documentation inside claimed it could be shared on any network.

But I could not convince the iBook and the XP machine to share the printer with each other. Apple said it was the router (D-Link); D-Link said it was the printer (HP); and they said it was my AirPort!

After several weeks of research, I discovered that a Mac quirk with OS X and XP is that OS X will not recognize printer names that have special characters in them (like spaces, underscores, dashes, etc.). This little piece of information would have saved me hours and hours on the phone to the various tech support groups.

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Mac OS X Hints
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