NETGEAR PS101 Mini Print Server

Was a real workhorse and did job without any issues. Last a long Long time.

Almost plug and play. But works great

I have bought this print server for about a year, and it brought me nothing but anger and frustration every time I wanted to print something.First of all, you could not just send your print out to the server. You had to ping it first to "wake it up." Otherwise, it wouldn't respond to the client.Then, sometimes even pinging wouldn't work. The server responded to ping but I still couldn't print. The client on my PC kept telling me that there wasn't a server. Rebooting the server or my PC would not always work.Worse, often when I tried to use their tools, trying to "shack up" something (there weren't sufficient tools in the first place), the tools sometimes crashed and the server port disappeared from my PC. I had no way to get the port back, but to uninstall and install the thing again.Do not buy it. If you really want it, I am selling it cheap.

I have to say that I'm not at all impressed by this product. I originally got it because of its size (it's relatively small), and the fact that I have an older laser printer with a parallel port interface (HP LaserJet 6P).My main problem with the product has been its unreliability to complete a print job. Whatever I send to the printer, I have about a 50% chance of actually seeing output. That drops to around 10%-20% if two or more jobs are being sent concurrently (what's the point of having a print server if one can't print more than one thing at a time?). I should note that this happens whether printing from Windows 2000, OS X or Linux (lpr or CUPS).My hunch is that printer support is iffy, but one is hard pressed to find out from NetGear which printers work and which don't. Unfortunately experimentation is often the only route. I'm pretty sure the printer is fine, as when I use a computer to share the printer (via printer sharing), I never lose a job and everything works well.Losing jobs wouldn't be such a pain if all printing was done from the same room as the printer (since it would be easy to tell when something needed to be printed again). However, in our household, we have two wireless laptops, and it's a pain to have to always walk into the office to make sure the print job got through right away rather than just being able to rely on it getting done to be picked up later.Another complaint I have is that the unit seems to lose its configuration quite regularly. I find that if I power cycle it, I have about a 20% chance that it will reset to factory defaults. This is a pain for me, since I print from OS X and Linux which both like to have a static IP for the printer. When the unit resets, it loses its IP address, and all of a sudden I can't find the printer.The only reason I didn't give this product one star is because when it doesn't lose my print job and actually retains its configuration, it actually works semi-well.Overall, if you're like me, and you don't like constantly tweaking, prodding, goading, etc. to get something to work, or you might be printing from outside the immediate vicinity of the printer, I would spend the extra money and desk space and get something that works reliably.

I am disapointed in the Netgear PS101 in that it is not bi-directional. It will not report low ink cartridges, paper out, or other printer status functions. My printer is a Canon i550. Otherwise it works great and was very easy to set up.My Canon i550 has a USB port as well. I set up the computer beside the printer to use that port and it is bi-directional, providing feedback on printer status. Printer seems to work well using both the parallel and USB.

I am computer savvy, the installation left a little to be desired. If you follow their instructions, it works no problem. But I wanted a more custom install. Great for at home use. I have it at the office on a domain. The unit sits on the network independantly and does not have security. Product has worked as needed for one year perfectly!

For whatever reason, the HP Laserjet 1100A used a different, none standard printer cable connector, and it did not offer the standard type at all.From time to time, updates in Windows or other drivers would make the HP not work well. This device allows me to link the HP 1100A to the network and print from most of the computers.This device allows me to keep the Laserjet a tad longer - until I eventually just get rid of it.

Took a bit of time installing, directions were a wee bit confusing. Once installed it works like a charm. Can print from anywhere in my house wireless. It converted an older model parallel port printer into a new wireless - awesome.