As has been discussed above, this is a USB-attached drive.

Have you tried:

• Unplugging it
• Beginning monitoring the system logs using something like:
  
  Code:

  sudo tail -f /var/log/messages | tee /tmp/system_log.txt

  If you're using systemd's logging, then try "journalctl --follow | tee /tmp/system_log.txt" (sorry if that's not quite right---syslog user here)
• Plug the drive into the USB port
• Watch the logging output to see whether the device is being recognized, any error messages that are generated, etc.
• Are there "strange" messages generated when trying to mount the drive, etc.?

Any odd messages will be in the file created by "tee". Post the contents if there are errors that don't make sense.

HTH...

I think there is still some misunderstanding.

Have you tried connecting the printer to the network (either via a print server or via the router) then printing?

Have you gotten the print server (or similar) suggested or are you still just doing nothing because of frustration?

How are you now sending a print job to the printer? Still via the windows machine? or directly on the network?

Do you still think your understanding and beating your head against something you cannot figure out is better than trying the suggestions given by others with years of experience using and configuring network printers?

Thanks everyone.

I was able to recover data from the second drive using windows tools. The first drive is all bad blocks and I'll have to get a new one.

Thanks for everything guys. Much appreciated.