Hello forum. I need help because I made a big mistake: I bought a router TP-Link TL-WR1042ND which, as advertised on their website, supports linux and printer sharing (thanks to the USB port on the router itself) ... was all I needed.
Unfortunately, when the package arrived, I found that it supports linux OR printer sharing, in the sense that the printer is managed by a software available only for win and mac.
I think I’ve tried every possible combination in order to setup the printer via cups without success, it could not find the printer.
I contacted the (quite unpleasant) Tp-link support and they said that "it is a proprietary protocol, not developed for Linux, that uses an USB virtual port" (?!).
Does anyone have any advice (other than to throw the device in the trash and forget about tp-link)? Does anybody else owns this router? Is there a way to make it work?
Thanks for reading and taking the time to reply.

Nick

http://www.tp-link.us/products/detai...-WR1042ND#spec

according to their web page it makes zero mention of Linux not being supported for anything. its requirements for the OS are:

That being the case, I would contact them again and inform them of this. If they continue to refuse to assist in supporting their listed OSs, id file a complaint and get my money back.

Are you trying to use this as just a wifi router, or as a print server? If as a print server id get my money back and buy one of the many Linux Ethernet print servers out there. They work great in Linux both via web browser and via CLI. telnet is your friend for print servers.

If you are brave, a DD-WRT install "might" work like that.

Actually I just bought an Asus similar to that and didn't mess with it. Thought it would be a networked printer and not what appears to be a tcp over usb print.

Might keep looking at other web pages and searches. Be sure to use all the routers in that series.

Thanks lleb for your support, actually their website is misleading. I have already tried to get my money back but the support sent me a picture of the box of the router pointing out that (in small letters) there is a note: "the usb printer wizard currently supports Windows8/7/Vista …" Furthermore a deeper search on the site allows you to find documents that specify this. In my opinion they are unfair, but I think that legally everything is watertight. Surely they can count on better lawyers than I can really afford :-(
Let's say that this thread is the best I can do, at least I’ll prevent someone else from falling into the trick.
I need both: printer server as well as ethernet / wifi router … I could use a LAN port of the router to plug a print server but perhaps it's better to buy a new fully functional router.

I had already checked dd-wrt as well as openwrt, but both does not seem to support my model. Do you think it's worth trying anyway?

Seems it isn't supported or tested on that model yet. http://dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/USB


I would only try it if the original sites offer an exact image if you want to save it. Usually testing on unknown images require you to buy a new router. Seems I had looked on the OEM web page and it suggested there may be a dd-wrt available. Guess it could be a generic statement and not fact.

It might be worth it to look at dd-wrt documentation just to see if you might get the steps to work on this model in the OEM software. I assume it is some embedded linux type OS.

Bad luck! It's among the known incompatible devices: http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php...atible_Devices

Cpt... sorry, can you not take it back to were you got it from? If not, then id invest in a low end Linksys or D-Link print server, but the Linksys ones tend to work very well with Linux. Ive worked with several of them over the past year or so.