Windows Vista HP Photosmart c6100 Network Printer Problem

notrabiplex

New Member
Joined
Jul 5, 2007
Howdy folks. Here's the skinny.

A friend of mine recently bought two new things within about a month of eachother; first was the aformentioned HP Photosmart C6100 printer with built in WiFi, and not long after that, a shiny new laptop with Vista Home Premium on.

I had his wireless network humming with his previous XP machine and this printer before: he is an RVer, and therefore he uses a Verizon card for his broadband access, freeing up his ethernetwork for printing on-the-fly, as advertised by HP. His built-in WiFi card is set up with a static IP network through a Linkys router, with the only other node being the WiFi printer (also a static IP, natch).

Here's the problem: After I install the *ahem* NEW Vista drivers obtained from the HP site, the first few print jobs go off without a hitch. Invariably, however, I get a call within a few days, and the printer has disappeared from the Printers folder, Leaving only the standard print-to-file options in the Send To dialogue when the print command is invoked.

A perusal of the Network folder shows that the printer is located right where it should be, with the correct IP address and everything -- yet the printer no longer exists to the print subsytem. Any attempt at printer discovery also comes up empty.

If I uninstall the (bloated, ridiculously huge) HP driver software and reinstall it, it works again, even through a hard reboot of both the printer and the laptop. But 48 hours later, lo and behold, its tits-up once again.

Any ideas?

TIA,
notrab
 
I have a very similar problem. I have an HP XP machine hard wired to the Linksys router, an HP Vista machine also hard wired to the router. My 6100 printer is wireless. It works fine on my XP machine, but appears "Offline" on my Vista machine. This really stinks because my kids are doing their homework on this Vista computer and they can't print from it. Please email me at [email protected]. Thank you!
 
SAME PROBLEM HERE. Install - shows for 48hrs on Vista then POOF - gone. We have linksys wireless router with several XP machines.
 
At leaset some of you can print, I ca't download and set up, yes I am the Admin. I've got copys of xp, I know the fix.
 
This has been a known issue and there has also been an HP "patch" since late last year.

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This patch stops the uninstall problem, but doesn't fix the main problem that the printer appears offline. This problem only seems to appear after my pc has been on standby. The printer is good to print when I reboot, but not after it goes to sleep. Any advice?
 
This one doesn't apply to Vista(originally), but it worked for me and I am using Vista, give it a try.

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I have to say that the HP Printer software is some of the worst I have come across. Why do they need a 130MB install and 10 different programs to run a printer and scanner driver?

After much frustration with the 6100 drivers I have recently installed the 7200 standard Windows driver and 'seems' to be working OK as I refuse to install that HP software on my new clean and working copy of Vista. I haven't tackled the scanner bit yet which will get there.

For anyone that is running it I would recommend running msconfig and removing all the programs it launches at startup.

HP please write some decent printer driver software and don't force us all to run a stack of different programs at startup.

On the good side the printer hardware is great.
 
I have the same type of set up but with a Sprint data card, Linksys wireless router, the HP 6100 series wifi printer. Twice now we can no longer print.
I too need the fix if you have it figured out. [email protected].
frustration level is high with this product.

Kathy Lloyd
 
I have exactly the same problem with Vista. I had before an XP and it use to work ok.... There are no corrections in the HP site and if you try to contact by chat someone the C6100 isn't in the supported products list anymore :/

??? Is there any Apple printer ??
 
I've had similar issues as well. But, until I read this thread it hadn't occurred to me to see if the printer was online or not! Doh! So, I right-clicked on the printer and selected "Use Printer Online". And it worked! Now, it will probably go offline again in a matter of time, but at least I can use it again now. I've been transferring files back and forth on a thumb drive, just to print.
 
I have the same problem with my hp6100 photosmart as well. I had to keep reinstalling the the download to get it to work which I have to do every day basically. Now it does not even recognize the usb cable or signal at all and I can no longer print. I have to email everything to my girlfriend at work so she can print it for me. Never had any problems like this with XP. I must say that Vista sucks really bad all around. It is the slowest and worst OS program. I am sorry but everyone seem to be knocking hp printer but these porblems did not exist prior to Vista. This frustration should be directed toward MS and their disgusting effort to make more money off the consumers by changing operating systems and forcing everyone to spend more money on their software and ad-ons. Vista sucks so bad and they know it, so they actually have commercials to promote it now. Has anyone seen the commercials where people are saying "this is window vista?" Yea right. Go bullshit someone else. This fucking stupid shit cost me quite a few jobs because I could not get it to print. I wish I had stuck to my old XP OS laptop. Vista FUCKING SUCKS PERIOD.
 
I had the exact same problems while printing from Vista:

* Bloated HP drivers that took forever to install
* Magically disappearing drivers
* Unable to print after 2 days of (re)installing the drivers

The most reliable solution is to get rid of Micro$0ft Windows Vista, and install a decent distro of linux that comes with built-in printing support.

My HP Photosmart C6100 works perfectly with Ubuntu out of the box.

PS. Still wondering whether this is Vista support, or Vista scrap, forum. I'd go for the latter :p

--
Dragon
 
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