Take pity on the "Router challenged"

[ZAPPER]

OK, here it is. Is there a wireless router for my all in one printer that will allow the "all" features to work? I mean can I scan a document on my all in one and send it wirelessly (Is that a word ?) to my laptop? I have been kind of looking, and all the boxes at the stores say not for all in ones, and the newer wireless built printers talk of printing wirelessly (there is that word again) but don't outright say that I can send scans to my laptop.

Questions, comments, suggestions, critique?

[Nelson37]

Right idea, wrong tool.

A router is for network connections. Most inexpensive All-in-one printers do not have an ethernet interface. Of those few that do, even fewer will allow scanning across the network.

The right tool would be a wireless print server, however you would need one that has the proper connections for your printer, most likely USB. Whether scanning would work at all is one question, it should, but the next problem will be the large file sizes being sent over a slow connection, this would seriously detract from performance. Cost of a wireless print server exceeds that of an inexpensive printer.

Most wireless-enabled printers are reception-only, not transmittal, meaning they will receive a print job from the PC, but not send a scan to the PC.

[ZAPPER]

Thanks for the lesson. And I was kind of afraid of that. I guess USB cables ain't all that bad.

I kind of have a problem. In the feild I often have the need to send faxes out for various reasons and I don't always have access to a fax or even a land line for that matter. I figure on getting the smallest all in one that I can now, and scanning and E-mailing the documents around as needed. Unfortunately, believe it or not, some folks don't have e-mail access all of the time and some of the government agencies only accecpt faxes and some people can only fax documents. So I guess I will be opening up somekind of E-Fax account for my notebook too.

Man! For a paperless future things sure can get tricky.

[Nelson37]

You can use a cell phone for field access to internet, I would ditch the all-in-one idea and just get a small sheet-fed scanner. I HATE Visioneer products but I think they make a small portable scanner of the type you need.

And yes, the "paperless" office actually generates more paper than ever before.

[mats.hogberg]

Also have a all-in-one hooked up with USB on one of my boxes at home. While I can print fine from any computer (wire and wireless) on the network, if I want to scan, I have to use the computer the printer/scanner is hooked up to.
Possibly if the printer itself came with Ethernet, but even then I doubt it.

/Mats

[SingSing]

I think this is what you need HP Photosmart 2710 Wireless All-in-One

[kschang]

I think this is what you need HP Photosmart 2710 Wireless All-in-One

Nah, that one just happens to have a wireless printer server built-in. You can add a Bluetooth receiver for printing if you have Bluetooth peripherals like Camera Phones and such, but that's extra cost.

What the original poster needed is "wireless USB". But those won't hit market until September. Belkin has press releases in Jan 2006 about them, but they ain't available yet.

[rallynavvie]

IIRC any USB to network print adapter will only support the printing functions such as TCP/IP or LPR printing. I don't think I've seen a network print adapter that supports extended features on every printer. If it has the network adapter built in there are probably ways to make it work, but without designing your own RIP server for your printer you won't find a simple solution for sharing out your printer's extended functions to every computer/device on your network, be it wired or wireless.

And scanning over the network is perfectly OK where it is supported. I have several network scanner/printers at work that have no lag while sheet-feed scanning at high resolution. This is all just over one very cluttered 10/100 network.

[SingSing]

Actually, Printer is the only chore one can does well from a remote location.
Scan, Fax... need the user physically there to deal with paper.

There are no demands, thus no product available.

[unclebud]

You can run your scanner and transfer files to and from your notebook wirelessly using software like PcAnywhere. You could even run your base computer from your laptop wirelessly. I've used this for years an it works well.
Microsoft includes Remote Desktop with XP but the host computer has to have XP Pro.

[Bondiablo]

Dlink makes a fairly inexpensive wireless router with a built in USB print server but if you use any file sharing programs I'd stay away from dlink, in fact very few routers can handle the large number of connections made by those programs.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16833127038

[doppletwo]

This is the second thread lately I have seen about scanning wirelessly.


Sorry, but am I missing something here? Don't you have to be in the room to use a scanner?


Do you have a robot that places the pics on the scanner for you?


I am really sorry about that rant please excuse very much.


I would put in my two cents for solutions, but it loks like the bases have been covered.

[ZAPPER]

It ain't like plugging in a cable is a back breaking chore, but still I kind of thought it would be neat not to have to.

[Doramius]

Ahh, laziness. You are to be commended. :bow:

However, the only thing wirelessly for scanning that is most practical is a camera or camera/phone. Bluetooth technology for those is available.

However, convenience of eliminating cables isn't as popular as one may think. Someday it will happen......Someday. We'll still need to have a cable for power at least.

Wireless does help eliminate cords, but it also saves cost. How much does it cost to wire a PC 300 feet away? You have cable, outlets, & connectors which aren't too expensive, but who's going to install it. -In the workplace today people need to be more mobile. I work for a mortgage company, and having a laptop (though I hate them) is virtually essential. You can't be fiddling with wires all the time.- So one computer locked in the same position isn't bad to straight wire, but if you do multiple computers, you just blew it all out of the water. 3 computers in cabling, wired router, and other accessories with distances of 300 feet from each other is more expensive than a wireless system. Thus the reason why wireless systems are created the way they are. COST! For the same cost of 3 computer connections I can add who knows how many more connections. Cabled system will get quite costly. It just so happens, convenience is there as well, which makes wireless systems also practical.