Network Printers - IP Allocation Best Practice

[RabbieBurns]

Whats the best practice for issuing network printers with IPs. Currently ours here are DHCP with a reservation. But an issue has arose which has caused them all to go out of whack.

 

I've always personally assigned network printers with a static address previously..

 

Is there a suggested 'best practice' ?

[SimpleSi]

I use static AND DHCP reservervation (same IP obviously)

 

That way - I give myself 2 chances

 

regards

 

Simon

[p858snake]

I use static AND DHCP reservervation (same IP obviously)

 

That way - I give myself 2 chances

 

regards

 

Simon

Pointless? if the device is set to use a static IP it will never request a dhcp lease.

 

Unless your putting them in the same pool as the available leases for other devices and not creating a exclusion range for them.

[mac_shinobi]

I use static AND DHCP reservervation (same IP obviously)

 

That way - I give myself 2 chances

 

regards

 

Simon

 

sounds like he creates the reservation in dhcp and excludes it so it is not assigned or dished out to any other device but on the device itself ( printer / copier ) he gives or assigns the device the same static ip address as the one he excluded ( I think )

 

Although if something goes wrong with dhcp then the clients ( computers ) would have problems surely ?

 

So dhcp would need fixing / looking into and resolving anyway, easier to leave the device set to dhcp and reserve by mac address and exclude from the dhcp pool

Edited May 10, 2010 by mac_shinobi

[SYNACK]

Pointless? if the device is set to use a static IP it will never request a dhcp lease.

 

Unless the device looses its config or some helpful child resets it.

 

I use DHCP assigned static IPs just to make it easier from a configuration and documentation standpoint. If they are all listed in DHCP it is really easy to find them. The one place where this falls down is during a long power cut where the servers shut down and then take longer to come back up than the printers leaving them with no ip address.

[mac_shinobi]

Unless the device looses its config or some helpful child resets it.

 

I use DHCP assigned static IPs just to make it easier from a configuration and documentation standpoint. If they are all listed in DHCP it is really easy to find them. The one place where this falls down is during a long power cut where the servers shut down and then take longer to come back up than the printers leaving them with no ip address.

 

Not sure about the printers but copier wise you can assign them a hostname and if using dhcp I get to the web interface and add them as a printer by using the devices hostname so regardless of the ip address changing it will always take you to the correct web interface or print to the correct device, obviously if you are using static ip address then either the ip address or hostname ( if one exists device in question ) so the above might be a moot point.

[SimpleSi]

Well maybe I'm fooling myself but my thinking is that static ip sorts out the printer but when it resets itself (as HP2600s are prone to do) then it reverts to DHCP and pics up the DHCP reservation.

 

Have I got something wrong?

 

regards

 

Simon

Edited May 10, 2010 by SimpleSi

[RabbieBurns]

Unless the device looses its config or some helpful child resets it.

 

I use DHCP assigned static IPs just to make it easier from a configuration and documentation standpoint. If they are all listed in DHCP it is really easy to find them. The one place where this falls down is during a long power cut where the servers shut down and then take longer to come back up than the printers leaving them with no ip address.

 

This must be exactly what has happend. One campus was getting a scheduled power cut off, so shut the servers down on friday night, and powered them back on Sunday. The printers would have just gone off and on whenever they cut the power (4 or so hours downtime on the saturday)

 

That explains it. Thanks

[budgester]

I use DHCP assigned static ip address's.

 

However what I tend to do is some thing like the following

 

192.168.0.1-50 Servers

192.168.0.50-0.100 Switches

192.168.0.100-0.200 Printers

192.168.0.200-3.254 General DHCP

 

Subnet mask 255.255.252.0

 

So make sure that there are blocks set aside for various equipment.

[featured_spectre]

I use static IP...Servers and Printers are all IP'd from 10.9.xx.240 - 10.9.xx.253 (aside from DC which is 10.9.xx.1 and DNS 10.9.xx.254) - simply for the fact that there is not that many in my school.

 

Switches and such like are on 10.9.xx.220-10.9.xx.239

 

General DHCP 10.9.xx.2 - 10.9.xx.219

 

All on a subnet mask of 255.255.252.0

Edited May 10, 2010 by featured_spectre

[SYNACK]

Not sure about the printers but copier wise you can assign them a hostname and if using dhcp I get to the web interface and add them as a printer by using the devices hostname so regardless of the ip address changing it will always take you to the correct web interface or print to the correct device, obviously if you are using static ip address then either the ip address or hostname ( if one exists device in question ) so the above might be a moot point.

 

Yes you can do this but it does rely on DNS being up and the printer successfully registering with it, if in the above case the servers have gone down due to a power failure then the DNS servers won't be up and won't register. Assuminig that you have Netbios enabled on all your gear and it is all on the same subnet then it will usually resolve that way but can take some time to resolve the name to an actual address. This can cause issues in itself when stuff is first switched on or accessed causing delays and failures. As netbios type resolution is a now a secondary technology and is on its way out I prefer the direct route with ip if possible in the deployment.

[mac_shinobi]

Yes you can do this but it does rely on DNS being up and the printer successfully registering with it, if in the above case the servers have gone down due to a power failure then the DNS servers won't be up and won't register. Assuminig that you have Netbios enabled on all your gear and it is all on the same subnet then it will usually resolve that way but can take some time to resolve the name to an actual address. This can cause issues in itself when stuff is first switched on or accessed causing delays and failures. As netbios type resolution is a now a secondary technology and is on its way out I prefer the direct route with ip if possible in the deployment.

 

We have had a few power cuts where I work and have never had any lag or issues with dns resolving to correct ip addy - even though its manually and statically assigned to the printer as I find it easer to remember the hostname and also type the hostname into the address bar then typing out an ip address.