Just stumbled on this and it looks as if someone here might be able to help me out with a XP Pro peer-to-peer network problem. I'm running XP pro configured as a "home gateway" as it is always on so others on the network can get access to the internet. Following the XP Pro network setup wizard is fine, and its DHCP server works issuing IP addresses to other computers and printers on the network (peer-2-peer). My problem is I want to use it to share printers but I cant make it work. I can ping the printer from the designated "home gateway" using the printers IP address okay, but not by printer name. Other pc's on the network running XP Pro and '98 can ping the printer name and get a responce. I could assign the DHCP assigned IP address to the LPT1: simple TCP/IP setup, but with DHCP running the printer might at some stage get assigned a different IP address meaning that all users could lose the shared printer resource. How the heck do I kick the "Home Gateway" to recognise the printer name, not just IP address??? Regards, Nick

If you can ping based on IP and not by name, then it maybe a DNS issue. The reason you can ping by name on the 98, is because it uses WINS. My first suggestion is to statically assign the print device an IP. And configure the device on your "Gateway". Secondly, check your DNS settings, perhaps you need a DNS record added for the print device. ~PhillyMCSE

Lot of goobly-de-goop here. "home gateway" is ICS [internet connection sharing]. A shared printer is not the same thing as a print server device which does use a ip address. Don't confuse the two. A peer to peer network has no wins server or dns server except one referanced for Internet access which you can't edit. You can't assign a dhcp address to a lpt port and if shared the printer has nothing to do with ip or dhcp. It is shared which means \\servername\sharename. This is not to be confused with ip printing and using a print server which is a independent device that acts as a server. Since this/these are printers connected via lpt and not tcp/ip you can not "name" your printer. When you "name" something you are associating a netbios name like "my server" with a ip address. You would do this in a peer to peer network by using lmhosts files. But like I said you can't give a ip address to a lpt port or a shared device so that is moot. When you ping you are pinging the workstation ip address not a printers ip address hence no name translation. In dhcp you can "reserve" a ip address. This is where you associated the ip address with the mac address of the nic card. this means that network interface will always get the same ip address.