Connecting A Printer To The Network Using A Switch And A Wireless AP. Anyone Done It?

[farquea]

I had the idea to put a printer on the top of each laptop trolley so that we can remove printers from classrooms as they only print when they use the laptops. The trolley we have has a built in 5 port switch and a wireless AP. We dont use it as we have Wireless AP's in the roofs of each room so i want to connect a printer to the network using the switch and AP in the trolley. I can get the AP connected to the network, ping it etc and working as a client but when i configure the printer i cant ping it at all

 

I've almost given up with it but wondered if anyone had managed to do this before and could maybe help me with where i am going wrong?

[SimpleSi]

What make/model is the trolley AP? (And the roof AP?)

Can you administer it over http - does it work - does it work via a separate wired connection (ie. not plugged into the trolley AP)

This is in case you are pinging over wireless and the AP is responding directly instead of being bridged across to the main celing AP.

 

regards

Simon

[farquea]

Trolley AP is a D-Link. I can get it setup as a wireless AP Client, join it to the school wireless and into the management console on it wirelessly through from my desktop computer and ping it etc although i can only get it to work if i use a 172.29.128.xx ip and default gateway of 172.29.143.254. Any other IP range and it doesnt work so i assume our wireless has been configured to only allow and use 172.29.128.xx addresses. subnet mask on everything is 255.255.240.0.

 

The AP is plugged into a 5 port Netgear switch in the trolley. If i then plug in a printer to the switch it gets an address from the 5 port switch i assume as its not an address like you should get if you just plug into the wall. we have our printers on a 172.29.95.xx range with a default gateway of 172.29.95.254. If i set the printer to this i then cant ping it. I also tried setting the printer to use a 172.29.128.xx address and gateway 172.29.143.254 so that it was on the same as the wireless AP but still doesnt ping.

[SimpleSi]

Quite large and complex IP scheme you've got there!

 

Are you using static IPs?

 

I'd try connecting a laptop via cable (with wi-fi disabled) to the trolley AP directly and see if it has any connectivity with both sets of IP ranges (e.g try pinging out from it as well as in/check T'itnernet access etc)

 

regards

Simon