Do you talk AppleTalk?

December 10, 2006 3:53 PM

MacNetworkingFilter: Setting up a print server in a small office–Ethernet, AppleTalk, wireless, oh my… Lots

I'll be setting up a small office for a client. She has three printers that she'd like to print to wirelessly. Luckily, she has an old G4 tower that she's not using that can act as a print server. It all makes sense except for this one piece.

One of the printers is a GCC Elite 12/600 that she connects to via the Ethernet port, of which there is one on the tower. I've set it up before, and the printer is chosen in the Printer Setup Utility as an AppleTalk printer, not IP. Works fine when connected straight into the computer's Ethernet port.

My question is this: Will the printer still talk to the server computer properly if they are both connected to two different ports on a NetGear WGR614 wireless router? The AppleTalk data doesn't have to be transmitted across the wireless connection, because the client computers will connect to the printer through Printer Sharing, but I'm not sure if the printer will work the same as if it was connected directly to the computer. Make sense?

If the above won't work, do I need a different type of Ethernet hub to be able to connect the printer to the computer, and the computer to the router? Please advise. Let me know if you need more information, and I may try to post a link to a schematic. Thanks!

posted by al_fresco to computers & internet (17 comments total)

My question is this: Will the printer still talk to the server computer properly if they are both connected to two different ports on a NetGear WGR614 wireless router?

As long as they're on the same subnet (which they will be if they're each plugged into one of the number ports), it makes no difference to AppleTalk.
posted by cillit bang at 4:05 PM on December 10, 2006

Schematic (of sorts) here.
posted by al_fresco at 4:05 PM on December 10, 2006

As long as they're on the same subnet (which they will be if they're each plugged into one of the number ports), it makes no difference to AppleTalk.

So it doesn't matter that the router doesn't specifically say that it works with the AppleTalk protocol? It just works through the Ethernet connection? I think that's what you're saying, and that's what I'm hoping.
posted by al_fresco at 4:21 PM on December 10, 2006

al_fresco raises a good point. A hub would simply repeat every packet it hears on one port to every other port, but a switch or router that doesn't "understand" Appletalk may not actually forward the packets correctly.

(if this is the case, I believe Appletalk can be tunneled through TCP/IP)
posted by NucleophilicAttack at 4:23 PM on December 10, 2006

A "router" routes between subnets (usually between the local network and a modem).

Within a subnet, both IP and Appletalk exist on top of ethernet's low-level system of frames and MAC addresses. I'm pretty certain a network switch only uses these to route frames, so the protocol above does not matter.
posted by cillit bang at 4:39 PM on December 10, 2006

The NetGear WGR614 will switch AppleTalk packets between the 4 LAN Ethernet ports, but it will not route AppleTalk packets to or from the WAN Ethernet port or the WiFi port.
posted by RichardP at 4:59 PM on December 10, 2006

why not just print through TCP/IP (the IP Printer setting)? if the printer's hooked to the netgear, it's getting an IP address, and you should be able to set up OS X to print that way.
posted by mrg at 5:08 PM on December 10, 2006

cillit bang & RichardP: Thanks, that's what I was hoping, and what I'm basing my setup on.

mrg: If you can tell me how to get it set up that way, cool, but I tried it in the past and couldn't get it to work. In my understanding, it is not a true IP printer, like the 16/600N (N for Network, presumably). I'd love to have it work that way, so if you have some advice, I'd love to hear it.
posted by al_fresco at 5:19 PM on December 10, 2006

Is she using Mac OS X? You didn't specify an OS.

There is a link (PDF) off of the URL in your original post.

It describes how to set up IP printing. Did you install the drivers? This FAQ item says how to assign the printer a static IP address.

Mac OS 7.x + up can print to IP printers. You're going backwards by trying to shovel AppleTalk into the mix.
posted by drstein at 7:23 PM on December 10, 2006

drstein: Thanks for taking the time to check that all out. I'll be upgrading the G4 tower (the server machine) to Tiger. I installed the drivers and tried to set up IP printing on her iBook running 10.3.9, but couldn't get it to work, but was able to get it working using AppleTalk. I'll try again once I get Tiger installed, but I wanted to make sure that I'd be able to get her printing over AppleTalk in case that doesn't work out.
posted by al_fresco at 8:01 PM on December 10, 2006

Well, AppleTalk is dying. It's not even in use at Apple and hasn't been for years. Try to avoid it if you can.

What happened when you tried it with the iBook? IP printing has worked pretty good for a long time now. I rarely run into issues with it, and the issues I have run into are usually because the printer turned itself off.

I'd try giving the printer a static IP address and then installing the drivers. Once that's done, follow the directions in the PDF.

Or, see if there's a need for an OS X Server. Install that, and set up the print queues that way. There's more than one way to skin a cat. :D
posted by drstein at 10:42 PM on December 10, 2006

Multi-port wireless routers typically have two internal sections: a multi-port Ethernet/802.11x switch that connects all the LAN ports (including the wireless ports), and a two-port IP router that connects an internal port on the switch to the WAN port.

Switches work at the Ethernet frame level. They don't care what's inside the Ethernet frames they shunt around, and they don't care whether those Ethernet frames are being carried on cables or wireless, so anything layered on top of Ethernet (including TCP/IP and EtherTalk) should work just as well via the switch as it does via a direct connection.

If you don't involve the WAN port, you're only using the switch, not the router, so you don't need to run IP. You shouldn't have any trouble mixing IP and EtherTalk, either.

BUT

if all your devices can in fact speak TCP/IP (and judging from this FAQ answer, the 12/600 does, albeit without DHCP support) you're far better off using that and turning everything else off, simply because TCP/IP is better supported by more devices than anything else, and is generally better understood. If you get hit by a bus, your client will have fewer maintenance problems if all your devices are using the same networking protocol for everything than if they're using an odd mish-mash of legacy protocols.

Something else worth considering: in a small LAN environment, an actual print server might be an unnecessary complexity. If all your printers can connect straight to the LAN, you might be better off configuring the client computers to talk directly to the printers.
posted by flabdablet at 6:04 AM on December 11, 2006

Thanks, everybody. I'm certainly going to give IP printing a good try before I try the AppleTalk route again.

flabdablet: If all your printers can connect straight to the LAN, you might be better off configuring the client computers to talk directly to the printers.

Two of her printers are consumer-grade USB printers. They need to be served to connect to the LAN, no? Hence the server machine and printer sharing. Otherwise, yeah, it would be great to have a trio of IP printers.

Thanks again!. I'll tackle this tomorrow or Ednesday, and let you know how it goes.
posted by al_fresco at 8:32 AM on December 11, 2006

Wednesday.
posted by al_fresco at 8:33 AM on December 11, 2006

Yes, USB printers will need some kind of server, and if you already have the G4 hanging about doing nothing useful, it's as good as any. Given that the two USB printers will be got at via the server, the Principle of Least Surprise says you probably should treat the Ethernet printer the same way instead of making it a direct connection.

This means that the protocol you run between the server and the printer will never even be visible to the user; I can't imagine that the a print server is ever going to need software updates once the setup is actually up and running, so AppleTalk's presumed lack of longevity ceases to be a problem.

In fact, if the 12/600 wakes up from a factory reset speaking AppleTalk, and if all you have to do to make the G4 talk to it is plug it in and tell the G4 it's an AppleTalk printer, the Principle of Least Fiddling says that's what you should probably do.
posted by flabdablet at 5:29 PM on December 11, 2006

*still waiting for al_fresco to report back*
posted by drstein at 6:58 PM on December 14, 2006

Thanks again for all of the good advice. GCC tech support themselves seem inconclusive about the TCP/IP printing. The client is actually looking into getting a new color laser printer with networking built in, possibly wireless, so no news is good news for now.
posted by al_fresco at 1:34 PM on December 18, 2006