From the course: Help Yourself: Tech Tips Weekly

Working with printers in Windows

From the course: Help Yourself: Tech Tips Weekly

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Working with printers in Windows

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- [Narrator] A printer works like a specialized computer, one that serves a single purpose, getting digital information printed on paper. Printers offer other features as well, such as scanning, copying, and faxing. Specifically, the subject here is printing, because most productivity software features a print command on the file menu. Printers can be connected directly to the computer by using a USB cable. More often, however, printers are available directly on the network, wired or wirelessly. This choice allows all network printers to be available to all computers on the network as a resource. Even when a printer is directly connected to a computer, it can be shared as a network resource. The downside is that when the connected computer is turned off, the printer is unavailable. So it makes sense to connect all printers directly to the network. The good news is that connecting a printer to a network is a painless operation. For a wired network, plug the network cable into the printer. For a Wi-Fi network, use the printer's control panel to access the Wi-Fi network, and input the password. Windows instantly recognizes printers attached to the network. You need not configure a thing, though some printers may need to be added manually. Printers may also come with companion software. This software isn't necessary to use the printer in Windows. In fact, my experience is that using the printer works better without its companion software, but the choice is up to you. Printing is often the ultimate result of your labors. As such, it's not as common of an activity as saving a document. But because another device is involved, problems can crop up. These issues and their solutions are addressed in another Tech Tips video.

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