Printer Problem - Panasonic KX P7100

I take the point that we are reliant on manufacturers to improve the drivers
and iron out any incompatabilities with Vista. However, I am mystified how,
when I plugged my Panasonic in for the first time, Vista recognised it, asked
for the CD it came with, installed the drivers and I successfully printed
from it.

And then, the next day (having installed Office 2003, which may or may not
be related) the only printers listed were the Microsoft Office XPS, and the
other similar sounding one. Despite my printer being listed in the Device
Manager under the USB list. I've deleted it, tried reinstalling it, turning
off both printer and computer between attempts, but Windows has decided it no
longer recognises it and because you can't manually force Vista to recognise
USB printers ("It will load the drivers automatically"), I'm stuck with a
'dead' laser printer. None too pleased, I can say.

Any thoughts, anyone?

I have the same problem and according to thier site, they dont have any plan to release Vista drivers...

If you're running the 32 bit version of Vista, you can try the XP drivers,
but there's no guarantee they will work.

Hi

I too have a KX P7100, and have just built a new system which I put Vista on (I can dual boot back to XP if I desire though.) and after several days of head scratching and maybe a bit of swearing I think I may have stumbled across a solution.

Firstly I used the parallel port on the printer and the printer was detected and installed correctly. I Thought! I downloaded and used the WinXP Drivers and setup program to install the drivers. I didn't bother with a test print at installation time. I then went to use it the next day and nothing just a bunch of documents in the print queue not going anywhere.

I then tried the USB port the printer detected and showed up in the device manager under USB devices but no show in the printers folder. I then tried to install the WinXP Panasonic USB Drivers but they wouldn't install Arrghhh at this stage.

I then went back to the parallel port and changed the setting and address and communication types in the bios and whilst the computer recognised the printer at each bios change I was still not able to print.

I then downloaded the Vista drivers for the KX P7105/P7110 Printer from http://panasonic.co.jp/pcc/products/.../win_vista.htm and installed those drivers. Of course that didn't work using the p7105 Drivers. I then went back to the P7100 which was now showing in the printers folder and it started to work. I checked what port it was on and it was set to the KX P7100GDI Port (the panasonic USB Port).

It has now been working for about three days There seems to be a bit of an issue with duplex printing but other than that several pages at a time or multiple copies works.

I am not a tech nut but I suspect that maybe the USB drivers for the 7100 don't work in Vista but when you install the 7105 driver it installs USB drivers that do work in vista so when you install over the top of the 7100 and then choose the 7100 printer driver it automatically uses the 7105 USB drivers and Hey it works. I'm not sure if that is so but what do know That I have a Panasonic KX P7100 Printing in Vista.


Cheers hope this helps someone.

I know this was thread was started a year ago but I've just installed a
kx-p7100 on my vista home premium system printing to a USB port using
ideas given above. It appears to work so it may be of use to others.

Plug in the kx-p7100 in a spare USB port and it will autodetect and
commence installing the drivers, and at some point it will ask for the
disk. If you don't have the disk you can download the drivers from the
panasonic site (the xp drivers, there are no vista ones available),
unzip them to a directory on the hard drive, and then install the
drivers from that directory through the prompts.

It will say it is successfully installed but it doesn't actually work.
Nothing will print and the printer dialog just shows an error state if
you try to print. Best not try to print - just proceed to the next step.

Download the vista drivers for the kx-p7105 and install those directly
from the setup routine. On my system, even after the install, no
kx-p7105 showed in the list of installed printers. What it DID do
however was create a SECOND panasonic KXPUSB port in the list of
available ports in the printer driver properties dialog box.

Open the printer driver properties dialog box for the kx-p7100, go to
the ports tab, and put a checkmark in the KXPUSB port installed by the
7105 setup routine. At that point like magic the thing started to
print. I haven't tried the duplexer, I was just happy I didn't have to
trash the printer.

I have tried the above and it still does not work and I have still got
a dead laser printer. Would appreciate any help with a soluition.
Cheers,

Hi, recently upgraded to Vista 32 bit and WAS having the same problem tried to load vista drivers for P7105 and no luck...uninstalled and re-installed XP drivers from original KX-P7100 disk..vista was OK with this and Panasonic printer was visible in printer folder after install. I then opened Panasonic Port settings and as MelbMarx stated earlier selected KXPUSB port and printer now works but does not duplex however was able to print 2 pages in 1have'nt tried other functions but it definately does'nt duplex any more... (in port settings the KXPUSB is under KXP3 and looks like KXP... until you highlight with cursor)

hope this helps....another printer that does'nt need to go to the scrap heap and at least prints (if only on 1 side)

Also I think that Melb Marx idea is good however in my case printer worked when I installed only XP driver, KXPUSB port was available after I had uninstalled KX- P7105 Vista driver and re-installed KX-P7100 XP driver

Hey, guys...you saved me and my KX-P7100. We used the VISTA driver from the other model as suggested and we are PRINTING! Thanks a lot....