Customer Reviews

Cisco-Linksys WPS54G Wireless-G 802.11g Print Server

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(64)

 

 

When installing the Print Server following the Quick Install Guide, the Print Server will not be detected on a wireless network when you are using WPA encryption.

But there is a way to make things work:
1) Temporary connect your Print Server with the network cable to your wireless router. You do not need to connect your printer yet to your Print Server.
2) Install the Bi-Admin tool from your installation CD.
3) In the Bi-Admin tool, you will be able to choose WPA security and enter your WPA key. When you click OK, these settings will be saved into permanent memory of the Print Server.
4) Now you can disconnect your network cable from your Print Server. Than you connect your Print Server to your printer USB cable. Your Print Server will be found now in your wireless network.
5) Now you click "User Install" to install the Windows Driver.

Success!

Cisco may be engaging in unlawful and deceptive trade practices by stating that this print server will work with "most" type 1 & 2 USB printers. What does "most" mean?
I spent 6.5 hours on the phone with Linksys techs trying to get connected to my Canon i850s. Nothing on the web site, disc manual or box listing printers it would not work with--a clear failure to inform when they have to know it won't.
One of the questions the techs ask is whether you are running a multifunction printer. (I wasn't.)Apparently this print server does not work with many multifunction printers, but Linksys and Cisco do not state that anywhere that I could find. (After I buy the thing is not the time to find out I got the wrong product.)
Finally a senior tech came online and said the print server would not work with my printer. I asked him for a list of printers that it would work with and he listed a few, but he said they were not allowed to put the list up on the web site.
Whoah! So that's why I spend 6.5 hours to find out your product does not work. [...]
Others, save yourself the headache, buy someone else's product.

Important: INSTALL THE PRINTER LOCALLY FIRST. Update the firmware after installtion from linksys's site after setup.

IMPORTANT: Plug the network cable into the server and into your network for setup. Never setup the printer wirelessly, the web server crashes on it when working wirelessly.

Once you have your printer installed locally, and plug the server into the network via cable, follow the setup directions as indicated. The setup re-maps the locally installed printer port to the linksys network port. All print servers do the exact same thing. I have two different types.

For advanced wireless setup, login into the web access page for the device, or use the Bi-Admin tool. That will allow you to edit the advanced wireless settings such as all WPA/Wep Keys etc. Once you wireless setup is done, unplug it and it should work right away. Do not attempt to access the web page wirelessly, it will crash itself.

As long as your printer is not a fax/copy/print or multifunction printer, this server works great. If you already have linksys wireless router, the setup is quick, easy and flawless. It is good to be aware of basic networking before working with any wireless technology. Support may not know what all individuals' system and user problems are, but they know what they are talking about. The fact is that this server works and it works well.

Here's another tip for successful installation of the WPS54G wireless print server: when the instructions say to locate your existing printer, unplug it from your PC, and plug it into the print server; what they really mean is your existing printer *must* be a fully configured, operating local printer before you can turn it into a wireless-accessible version.

Since we have a few PCs scattered around the house, in my case this meant lugging the printer around and installing it as a local device on each of these PCs, then setting the printer up with the WPS54G, and then going back to those PCs and using the Linksys setup wizard CD to turn all those local printers into wireless ones.

Once I did that everything went smoothly and I'm happily using the printer from multiple PCs.

I've given it 5 stars because it works well now I have it set up and running. The process of getting to this point was nothing short of going to the dentist for "pain free" dental work..

I read the reviews and decided to give it a go. No one seemed to find the setup easy so I went to a local store and bought the WPS54G so I could return it if I failed in my mission.

It took several hours of trial and error to get the darn think setup! In the end the final solution was simple. Here's my advice..

Make a small voodoo doll and call it "Linksys Managment". Then get the setup disc that is packaged in the box, (Setup Wizard ver 2.0 in mine), and smash it with a hammer. Take the shards of the disc and poke as many as you can into the most private places of the voodoo doll! The setup disc packaged is missing a vital step in the process and gives you no place to put in the WEP Encryption key for your network. (If you are using a secure network.)

Next, go to Linksys.com and download the latest FIRMWARE setup wizard. When I did this it was dated 7/25/05 51.1 mb. Unzip it and copy the files to a CD to replace the orginal CD, that is now serving a more useful purpose.

Next access your router setup and set it to STATIC IP addressing. You wont need to retain this setting once you have the WPS setup but without static ip addressing the setup wizard on my system could not find the WPS.

Run the setup wizard from your cd and run the "server setup" first. Plug everything in as they show. The WPS must be cable connected to the router to setup.

The wizard should now pick up the WPS and is a simple follow the steps setup. Now you can set up the WPS to Server Assigned IP adressing and add in the KEY1 WEP Encryption code that you used for your wireless server.

It took me a while to get to this stage, many trys and you have to power up and down the WPS if things go to crap, restart the wizard etc. I altered no other settings on the server setup and when I finished I did not save the Static IP setting so it defaulted back to dynamic.

I then ran the Computer setup option from the setup disc, for each computer in the house and the WPS set up first time on each computer.

It works fine now. Wireless and free like a bird! The printer is no longer a slave to one computer, and it only took 7 hours to work out...

First you'll experience the setup "wizard" which includes incorrectly-worded instructions about options that don't exist. And for a bit of fun, try hitting F1 to see the "help" file and watch as the installer asks you to locate the help file that's not there.

Then you'll discover that the thing won't connect to your wireless network because the wizard doesn't properly save WEP keys. After figuring out that the device has an admin Web server built in, you'll connect to it and fix the WEP problem and hook it up to your network. And happily discover that the wireless connection works! ...

... Until you plug it in to your printer's USB port and suddenly it drops inexplicably off the network. Note that the only purpose of this device is to sit on the network and talk to the printer via the USB port. So the fact that it can't do these two things simultaneously is quite the red flag.

And so you wait over an hour in the Linksys online support queue hoping for some help, and don't move up in line at all. But while you're in the queue you do some Google searching and find out that others have had the same problem and your printer is not supported by the device (even though it doesn't say that anywhere on the box, in the instruction manual, or on the Linksys Web site).

... You unplug the box and find out that it's really, REALLY hot (even though it's only been plugged in for about an hour.) You probably wouldn't have wanted it plugged in for a long period anyway, given that it would probably melt a hole through your printer.

So you put it where it belonged to begin with, in the garbage. And you're *still* in the support queue waiting...

A low-quality product with an extremely shoddy installer and zero support from the company that makes it. In short: AVOID!!!

This product is working well for me. The install instructions leave a lot to be desired. For example, it does not tell you that the SSID of the router and any encryption need to match exactly with your print server settings you set with the wizard, or you will get a connect failed error. The other thing that it does not tell you is that you have to switch the printer settings from a USB set up to a TCP/IP. (Printers, properties, Ports, Add port). You can get the IP address for this by connecting the print server to the router then press the reset button for 3 seconds. If your printer is compatible, it will print a page with the IP address you need for the print settings.

I didn't buy this from Amazon, but looked through the reviews because I was having a hard time getting set up. I won't go through week's worth of messing around it took to figure this out, but here's how I ended up getting it going. For starters I have a wireless router that came with my FIOS service, and a laptop with Windows XP Professional. The wireless network had previously been configured by the Verizon guy, but I think that the Windows XP default settings for a wireless netork were used.
First: Have the printer drivers installed and up and running from your computer.
Second: Turn EVERYTHING off.
Third: Get your router, print server and printer wired up with the ethernet connection between the print server and the router.
Forth: Turn on the router, print server, and printer only. Let them go through their thing.
Fifth: Turn on your computer and go through the print server set up.
Hope this helps. I think that my problem was that the print server and the router weren't able to communicate with the interference of the wireless network settings of the computer and this is why the computer had to be off.

I purchased the WPS54G, despite the number of bad reviews, many of which I now question the validity of. Here are some facts.

- WPA is supported out of the box on the WPS54G I purchased
- I have a Linksys WRT54GS Wireless G (w/Speedbooster) router
- two computers, 1 desktop wired into the router, and
one laptop wireless to the router
- my printer is a Canon i860.

I followed the advice of the higher rated reviewers.
- I ensured that my i860 driver was installed locally on each
machine first.
- if you plan to use the printer server wireless rather than
wired, then enable SSID broadcast, disable MAC address
filtering. You can leave WPA turned on, you will simply
need the SSID and the shared key during the print server
install
- I installed the print server from the computer that was
wired to the router (I stayed away from an install using
the wireless machine)
- I followed the easy to read linksys instructions.
- I plugged the printer into the print server
- I used the provided ethernet cable and connected the
print server to the router
- I powered up the router
- I insterted the Setup Disk, followed the onscreen
instruction (install the printer server first, then
later choose the setup computer)

Everything went smoothly. I would have been done in about
5 minutes, except that I had forgotten initially to enable
SSID broadcast and disable mac address filtering.

I then choose the setup computer option and ran that twice
one on the desktop, once on the laptop.

LESSON? Don't shy away from this from the numerous posts by
inexperienced folks. Its not rocket science, but if you
follow the suggestions on the reviews by those that were
successfull, you'll have success also. I love this think
and its got a huge print buffer.