
And it works fine when it’s connected to a Windows PC on my home network.īut neither Apple’s not HP’s driver let me print to that printer from my Mac when it’s shared from my PC, even though other Windows systems (and even Linux systems) print to it across the network just fine. This printer works fine with either driver when connected directly to my Mac’s USB port.
#APPLE HP PRINTER 10.4 DRIVERS#
Apple includes printer drivers for it in recent versions of OS X, and HP has drivers online. A very slick feature – when it works).Įven when OS X provided an opportunity for Apple to recreate the Mac operating system from the ground up, the ability to access a printer across a network remained, at least in part, a function that might or might not be included in each individual printer driver. (In fact, if a printer is shared, in many cases, the sharing computer can distribute drivers to other connected Windows computers as needed. In those network-enabled versions of Windows, any printer could be shared. On the other side – starting with Windows for Workgroups 3.10 and continuing through Windows 95 and later versions – Microsoft made printer sharing an operating system feature, not a printer driver feature. Apple even distributed replacement sharable printer drivers for some of their models. The LaserWriter 8 driver allowed many Postscript printers to be shared easily, for instance.īut most other printer drivers couldn’t be used to share printers. At that time, some printers had printer drivers that allowed them to be shared between Macs on an AppleTalk network. Let’s go back to the early 1990s, when up-to-date Mac users might be running something like System 7.1. Some of the reasons go way back to the Mac Dark Ages.

Making use of a shared printer connected to a Windows computer is still not as straightforward a process, however. Today, with OS X 10.4 Tiger, it’s generally reasonably easy for users with home and small business networks: Windows network shares (usually) show up in the Finder, and can be accessed without needing to be able to enter something like: smb://P4_10/DOWNLOAD Shared Printer Shortcomings Starting with OS X 10.2, Apple started to make it easier by attempting to recognize nearby Windows networks. Samba) clone of Windows’ network client, but users had to enter connection information manually in the Finder’s Go to Server dialogue box.
#APPLE HP PRINTER 10.4 MAC OS X#
Mac OS X 10.1 added support for the open source SMB (a.k.a.

OS X 10.0 didn’t have Windows networking at all as with the classic Mac OS, 10.0 users needed a third-party program like Thursby’s Dave to connect to shared Windows folders. Each version of OS X has done a better job than its predecessors of “playing nice” with Windows networks.
