Your Very Own Pet, Printer!
Whether this is your first or 87th printer, installing printers, making them work as well as keeping them working can be a full-time job on its own! In this Tech Witch Tip: We'll be talking all about printers!
1. I prefer to work on HP Printers just because they are what I have the most experience working with. Although their system is somewhat flawed and their software comes with a host of issues, I find the hardware to be the most forgiving.
2. Make sure you ask the right questions. If the printer you are looking at has great ink capacity, but the cartridges cost a ton of money, it may not be worth it. Ask clear questions about the warranty included with the printer you are buying, does it cover everything?
3. Get a service such as "Instant Ink" so that you do not have to worry about running out of ink.
With some manufacturers, you can sign up for a service that monitors your ink levels and usage, and sends you ink directly when you begin to run low. Sometimes you just don't have 50 bucks for new printer ink. By paying a smaller fee each month, you never have to worry about taking back your returnable pop bottles and cans to afford to print your thesis paper!
Ok, and now for basic printer tips and maintenance.
Printers can smell your anxiety. You may be laughing and wondering about my credentials on this, but I am telling you this in earnest as a person with more than 20 years of experience in IT. Printers can SMELL YOUR FEAR.
Don't ever let them know that you are desperate to print something, because if you do let them know, they will punish you by not doing it. It is well known that printers thrive on an adversarial relationship.
Printers will lull you into a false sense of security, then act up the moment they sense you are in a hurry or need to print something.
My advice, take advantage of this fact early on!
When you are adding your printer, give it a name you know it will hate. There are quite a few clever names that I have seen over time, 1 is just calling a printer "Bob Marley" cus it's always jamming.
I once named a client's printer "Client's name - Cranky Printer" and it behaved pretty well after I did that.
But how do you ADD a printer?
I'm going to assume you are using either a Windows Device or a Chromebook to add your printer and provide instructions from those manufacturers. I will also add the links for Apple and the most common Linux I can find, but I won't be able to support those as well, because... Apple and Linux... Well, let's just save them for another article. I have FEELINGS about them. I'm happy to support them in person, but it's a bit much for an article here.
In most of these instructions, you have the option of naming your printer. Choose something witty, if for no other reason than your own amusement. The levity will help you avoid dragging your printer out into a pasture and beating within an inch of its cute little electronic life. Maybe give it some googly eyes in an area that won't affect its function. Your printer will have a personality over time. It's like when you invite a new pet into your home, you're never quite sure what that animal is going to get up to once it's comfortable.
Thinking about a printer as an animal or personifying it in some way will actually help you a lot in troubleshooting. I know that sounds very odd, but trust me on this, you'll be able to more easily fix the darn thing if you think of it this way.
Problems that can arise.
Ok, my printer is definitely online, I can see the network light is on and it's solid, why the heck can't my computer see it? Or, in Dee-speak, "My printer and my computer are considering marriage counseling, or getting a divorce."
Why does this happen? Well, first, remember the 1st rule of printing: if you are anxious, your printer is not going to work for you. It's just one of those laws that Murphy keeps muttering on about. Take a few deep breaths and do the IT TECH!
Walk to the printer (music interlude)
Turn it off (music interlude with dancing!)
Turn it on again (more music)
Get a coffee (more music and dancing)
Go back to your computer
and PRINT THAT DOC! (Jazz hands)
Now for a somewhat realistic, IT-based answer.
Every internet fairing device has a home address or "Internet Protocol" address, this is more commonly referred to as an IP address. When I say every internet fairing device, I am including your modem/router. Your modem/router that comes from your internet service provider is the little box that invites the internet elves into your house to bake up the internet hot and fresh for all of your devices.
This little box has 2 jobs: to summon internet elves to your house, and secondly to assign IP addresses to your devices. Just like elves, your modem/router sometimes gets a bit cheeky.
Normally, your modem/router will assign your devices the same IP address. So, let's say for the sake of this analogy that your printer is living at 123 Sesame Drive in Anytown USA. Your Modem/Router will say "Ok, you there printer at 123 Sesame, over in Anytown, you keep being there and I'll send you stuff as I see it!" and the devices have a little handshake about it in their language, which has a name TCPIP. Sometimes though, sometimes the modem/router has had a bit of griefing from the internet elves and it says "That's it, we're all moving!" and tells the printer "No Friendo, you are no longer at 123 Sesame over in Anytown, you are now at 456 Astor Place in Paris, Texas."
The printer will be very confused about the sudden move, as any child would be. Your printer has friends at its printer school, it has a social life and a little community of like-minded devices that it's gotten accustomed to visiting with. So, the printer says "No, fuck you, I'm at 123 Sesame!"
The modem/router then doesn't recognize the device as your printer anymore, since he moved the whole household to another place, and the printer basically says "You're not my DAD!" and slams the door in the Modem/Router's face.
Well, what do you do? As a parent, you would knock on the kid's door after they've had a bit of time to sort out their big feeling and you'd reconcile, explaining your reasons for the move and that it's really very important that the kid feels included in this exciting new journey.
Modem/routers are not as good at seeking out their children/devices as humans can be, so to trigger the modem/router to talk to its printer child, you have to reboot the printer. Think of the reboot as that time that the kid spends sulking in his room. So, allow your printer to sulk in its room by rebooting it.
After the printer has rebooted, it'll come looking for its parents, and it will change its address, begrudgingly. If only it was so simple for parents to convince a kid it's time to move!
If that doesn't work, try rebooting all of the devices in order from the wall, to the printer, to the computer. This will look like this, unplug Modem/router, wait 12 seconds, plug it back in, wait for the lights to do whatever the lights do normally (this usually takes a minute or 2) then reboot the printer, wait for its network light to go solid, then reboot the computer to make sure that the computer is up to date on all the comings and going in its own household or network.
That will usually do it. If it doesn't, I'd recommend looking at the printer and seeing if you can find any error messages. Sometimes, printers will have the ability to look in on them via the internet. How you would do this is type the IP address into your browser directly.
If the page comes up, congrats, your printer is online but having some other weird issue you'll need to deal with. This is probably the time to email me unless you want to spend a lot of time on Google!
My email is support@techwitchdetroit.freshdesk.com, and you'll probably want to just copy/paste that into your email client. This email address will open a ticket in my system which is the absolute best and fastest way to get a hold of me!
I do a lot of printer maintenance including some mild cleaning and a small amount of hardware repair, and I'll be happy to put my years of experience to work for you!
I hope that this entry helps you understand your new pet printer better, and remember...
it can SMELL YOUR FEAR, so always approach the printer with an attitude of Zen. Your blood pressure will thank you.
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