Vista - XP, Vista, Printer Sharing and One BIG Mess

And yes a very big mess!! I have a Gateway desktop running XP Home SP2. The desktop is running a Free version of Avira. An Epson Stylus Photo RX500 is attached to this desktop by a USB port. I also have a Dell laptop runnnig Vista Home Premium SP1. My laptop has PC-cillin Internet Security 14. I am currently using a Wireless G WRT54G router. I would like to share the Epson printer between the two computers but when I select the printer in the Windows Vista Networked Printer Selection it says connecting then gives me an error message that says "Could Not Connect: Access Denied". I have tried all the tricks possible that I could find on the web. Including using the local port and connecting the printer to my laptop. I have not been able to find any solutions to this problem. If anyone has a solution for me, please post it.
Thanks so Much Everyone,
FlashCreations

Edit:
I tried the local port method from the desktop that the printer is attached to (Ex. I entered the address of the shared printer: \\Computer\Printer as a local port and my desktop also gave me a Access Denied Error. This leads me to believe this might be an issue with a firewall, but so far i haven't found any conflicts.

I was thinking that maybe it was your firewall blocking it, which one do you use on both machines ?
You have allowed sharing on the XP side of things as well I suppose.

I've just found this, see if there's anything in it that will help.


Network XP & Vista

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727037.aspx

Have a read of the above link re Vista File and Printer Sharing.

Permissions/Share info is there as well.

If using Norton, McAfee, Trend Micro I.S., make sure file and printer
sharing is enabled in THEIR firewall (or LAN allowed, depending on how their
Exceptions are worded in their Firewall)

1st thing to do is make sure that the Workgroup Name of ALL the computers is
the SAME.

In Vista Network and Sharing:

Network Discovery: ON (So it can see the other computers)

Network set to Private (Public is for hotspots, airports, etc)

File Sharing: ON

Public Folder Sharing: ON (Vista’s Public Folder is the same as XP’s Shared
Docs)

Password Protected: OFF (unless you want to set up identical usernames and
passwords (passwords can be different) on ALL computers in your Network) If
you have it ON, you will be asked for a username and password when you try to
access a Vista computer from an XP computer, or a Vista computer.

Also, run the XP’s Home or Small Office Network File and Printer Sharing
Wizard to include Vista in your “New” Network, even if you had an XP Network
set up prior to adding a Vista computer to it(redoing the Wizard seems to
work for XP machines!).

In “My Network Places”: “Set up a Home or Small Office Network”
OR under Accessories > Communications > Network Setup Wizard > Allow File
and Printer Sharing.

I do have Trend Micro I.S. so which option should I check from the exceptions:

• Outgoing messages (SMTP) <--Probably not this one
• Incoming messages (POP3) <--nor this one
• Incoming message (POP3) <--nor this one
• Web Services (HTTP)
• Secured Web Services (HTTPS)
• File Transfer (FTP) <-- Probably not this either
• Telnet
• Network News (NNTP)
• Windows Domain Service Protocol (Incoming)
• Multicast Address (Outgoing)
• IPv6 Multicast Address (Outgoing)

Also, I have to option to add one, if the one I need to enable is not on the list, what should I enable? The options I have in the Add Exception Window are:

• Target (All Application, Operating system components, or specified application [Has a box to locate the exe])
• Connection (Incoming or Outgoing)
• Action (Allow, Deny, Warn) <-- For my cases probably Allow
• Protocol (TCP, UDP, or TCP/UDP)
• Ports (All, Specify Ports [Can enter a number of a range of ports])
• IP Setting (All IP Addresses, IP Address (IPv4), IP Address (IPv6), IP Address Range (IPv4), IP Address Range (IPv6), Subnet Mask (IPv4), Prefix (IPv6), Broadcast, Multicast (IPv4), or Multicast/Anycast (IPv6))

I know this seems like a lot. My expertise lies in programming and system optomization. While I do very well know my way around a computer, I am not much of the networking type. Thanks for your help so far. This problem has been laughing me in the face for years. If anyone has further help, please post it!
Thanks so Much!
FlashCreations