I'm using Mandrake 9.1 and I'm trying to print to an Epson Stylus Colour 880 that is connected to a Windows XP computer. I've managed to have it working in the past, but only seemingly randomly.

I can connect to the XP machine fine using LinNeighborhood. All I have to do is enter a username and password that I have created as a user on that computer. I can view and mount the shares. I can also view the printer as well as a folder called print$ that seems to hold the printer drivers or something like that.

I've tried adding the printer with both the CUPS WWW admin tool and the Mandrake Control Center. There's no problem adding the printer. However, I cannot print anything. When I try to print a test page, the WWW admin tool seems to start (it goes to 7%). After 30 seconds or a minute, however, I get the following error:
Nothing else happens after this.

Does anyone know what the problem is or how I can fix it? Any info (websites, HOWTOs, instructions) would be greatly appreciated. Sorry if there's an easy answer to this that I'm overlooking. I've tried searching these forums and google, as well as reading any documentation I can find.

Thanks for your time. :-)

I can't really help you specifically but did you read the samba documentation that comes with it? If not you can go to the software installer in mandrake control center search for it and install it.
Also maybe you need to install a samba server on your windows machine.

Have you looked on the XP host...there is an add-in feature for Windows called "Unix printers support". You probably have to install and enable it. I know it is part of XP professional, but do not know if it comes with XP home...

Cheers

I added the Print Services for Unix on the winXP box (it's winXP home). I also set the TCP/IP Print server to start automatically on that computer. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to help anything.

Could this problem have anything to do with my router?