Vista - HP Color LaserJet 4550 - Networking Windows XP 32-bit (x86) with Widows Vista 64-bit

Hi there,

I currently have a Windows XP (x86) computer running with my "HP Color LaserJet 4550" printer attached.
It has been working great for ages, and I share it on my network to my other home computers. All the other computers in my house are also 32-bit.

I recently purchased a new computer which is running 64-bit Windows Vista.
When I try to add the printer I get this error:
"The Server for the 'HP Color LaserJet 4550 PCL 6' printer does not have the correct driver installed. If you want to search for the proper driver, click OK. Otherwise, click Cancel and contact your network administrator or original equipment manufacturer for correct printer driver."

I went to the HP website and downloaded the latest 64-bit Vista drivers, but I still get the error after installing them.
I can see that in actual fact the 64-bit drivers need to be on the 32-bit Windows XP machine, but the setup won't run on it as it's a 64-bit application

Any ideas? Many thanks in advance...

PS.
I did a search a tried a few of the solutions which looked like they might work, but with no luck.
Eg. From the x64 pc navigating to the remote printers folder, right clicking and selecting "Server Properties", going to drivers and clicking add - the add button was greyed out...

download the x64 HP driver with the name

HP Color LaserJet 4550 PCL 6.

Don't use setup to install the driver, get the driver that has the inf
files, use the Add driver wizard in the printers folder server properties
(run as administrator).

Then make the connection to the XP machine. The client spooler service
knows that you did not install the x64 driver on the server, then will look
for the same named driver on the client, match the name and create the
connection.


If HP does not have a 64bit driver with this name, then you cannot create an
RPC connection to the 32 bit machine sharing the printer using this named
driver.

But it's pretty simple to create an SMB connection to XP using XP default
security settings, look for Local Port in other posts to go down that path.

--
Alan Morris
Windows Printing Team
Search the Microsoft Knowledge Base here:
http://support.microsoft.com/search/?adv=1

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

"pandaking" <guest@xxxxxx-email.com> wrote in message
news:8994848ab85516ca24878a054c20ebd7@xxxxxx-gateway.com...

Hi Alan:
I found vista comes with a 64-bit driver, BUT it is named differently:
It's "HP Color LaserJet 4550 PCL6" instead of "HP Color LaserJet 4550 PCL 6"

Any ideas? It seems the names need to be identical here. There must be a way of renaming them...

Also, It seems the only thing to download from HP for x64 is a Universal Driver, and I have got this working on both 32 and 64 bit (networked), but for some reason it prints in black and white. I can't work it out. I have two printers installed now from it - the 4550 and the universal printer which from what I can tell is a dummy printer which just links to the 4550. A test page from the 4550 works fine, but the universal driver prints black and white. I have gone through all the options to no avail, and all in all am not too impressed with it to be honest.

So really I need a way to rename the driver that comes with Vista x64, or some new way - you mentioned SMB?

Thanks for the help so far

I followed your suggestion and found the following thread which solved my problem:
Re: Vista does not discover printer

Many thanks