Installing drivers for networked Vista computer

I have an XP computer with a Dell 1700 laser printer connected to it.
My wife wants to use the printer. She's running Vista. My computer
says I can install additional drivers so other machines on the network
can use it. But I can't figure out how to install a Vista driver for
the printer. Is there a way to do this? Thanks.

Go to Dell's website for the printer and download the correct drivers to the
Vista machine. Install them on the Vista machine by double-clicking the
file you downloaded. The file will unpack itself and show you the path. You
only need to install the drivers, not the monitoring software. Then use the
Add Printer routine in Control Panel>Printers to add the printer, pointing
to the unpacked drivers folder.

This assumes you have already set up file/printer sharing between the two
computers since you're not using this as a network printer. If you haven't
already set up the sharing, you need to do this first.

Excellent, thorough, yet easy to understand article about File/Printer
Sharing in Vista. Includes details about sharing printers as well as files
and folders:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/l.../bb727037.aspx

A. Configure firewalls on all machines to allow the Local Area Network (LAN)
traffic as trusted. With Windows Firewall, this means allowing File/Printer
Sharing on the Exceptions tab. Normally running the Network Setup Wizard on
XP will take care of this for those machines.The only "gotcha" is that this
will turn on the XPSP2 Windows Firewall. If you aren't running a
third-party firewall or have an antivirus/security program with its own
firewall component, then you're fine. With third-party firewalls, I
usually configure the LAN allowance with an IP range. Ex. would be
192.168.1.0-192.168.1.254. Obviously you would substitute your correct
subnet. Refer to any third party security program's Help or user forums for
how to properly configure its firewall. Do not run more than one firewall.
DO NOT TURN OFF FIREWALLS; CONFIGURE THEM CORRECTLY.

B. For ease of organization, put all computers in the same Workgroup. This
is done from the System applet in Control Panel, Computer Name tab.

C. Create matching user accounts and passwords on all machines. You do not
need to be logged into the same account on all machines and the passwords
assigned to each user account can be different; the accounts/passwords just
need to exist and match on all machines. DO NOT NEGLECT TO CREATE
PASSWORDS, EVEN IF ONLY SIMPLE ONES. If you wish a machine to boot directly
to the Desktop (into one particular user's account) for convenience, you
can do this. The instructions at this link work for both XP and Vista:

Configure Windows to Automatically Login (MVP Ramesh) -
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/Autologon.htm

D. If one or more of the computers is XP Pro or Media Center, turn off
Simple File Sharing (Folder Options>View tab).

E. Create shares as desired. XP Home does not permit sharing of users' home
directories or Program Files, but you can share folders inside those
directories. A better choice is to simply use the Shared Documents folder.
See the first link above for details about Vista sharing.

Malke, I have the same problem as watha. I found your instrustions helpfull
but I still can't get my printer to work. I downloaded the R147091 driver
from Dell to my desktop and opened it but when I go to add printer they can't
find driver. Should I be setting the printer up on this computer or on a
remote? When I try to connect to the shared Dell Laser 1700 on the desktop I
get the message that proper driver not installed.
I have basic computer knowledge so this posting my sound confusing but I
would like any help availabe as to how to solve this problem. My laptop is
running Vista 64, could this be a problem. The R147091 download said it was
compatable with both 32 & 64. The printer works fine if I connect it direct
with the USB.

If the driver name from the machine sharing the printer does not match the
driver name you installed on the local machine, it's not the same driver.

Thanks for your reply Alan. Are you saying that I have to install the R147091
driver on my desktop as well as the laptop? The printer is connected to the
desktop via USB and is running XP. The laptop is wireless and Vista 64. I
tried downloading the driver and installing it on the desk by double clicking
it. It ran through an opening and istalling process and then I got the error
message saying that the system did not support that type of installition.

You will need to install an x86 driver for the device that uses the same
name as the x64 version. If Dell does not have a driver with the same name
you cannot create an RPC (Remote Procedure Call) connection to the printer.

You can create an SMB (Server Messaging Block) connection to the share in
the case of no matching driver.

[palmtree953]

I wanted to do the same thing as well. Thank you to Alan Morris for the tip ("install an x86 driver for the device that uses the same name as the x64 version").

Here's how I got it to work:

The XP machine, where Dell 1700 is connected via USB, has the XP printer driver installed (from the Dell XP install package). As I believe Gerald noted, if you try to install the Vista32/64 driver on XP using the R147091 installer, it complains that that the OS is not supported. But the package does include matching XP drivers, so get the R147091 extracted files to your XP machine (usually extracted to C:\Dell\Printers\drivers\print\Win_2kXP ).

In XP, go to "Printers and Faxes", right-click the Dell printer and get "Properties", then go to the "Advanced" tab. A "Driver" drop-down should have "Dell Laser Printer 1700" selected. Click "New Driver..." and browse to the INF file in the R147091's Win_2kXP driver folder. The listed driver will now be "Dell Laser Printer 1700 XL (V)".

Now go to the Vista64 (or Win-7 64) machine, and double-click the printer share. It will complain again, but this time if you point it to the INF file in C:\Dell\Printers\drivers\print\x64 it will match and will install. (I imagine for Vista32 you'd point it to the same Win_2kXP INF file).

Good luck!
:)