samba - May 2003 - VERY VERY Strange problem with Samba Printers

Hello :),

I have a very strange problem with printers shared via Samba. My
configuration:

- A Samba 2.2.8 server under Red Hat 8 as PDC
- Windows clients 9x/NT/2000/XP

All work fine: The clients can log into the pdc, access to its
shares and printers... butt.... in some W2k/XP I realized that
when a samba printer is configured as the Default PRinter in windows,
MS ACCESS 2002 can't open the reports. Other programs crash when they try
to print.

 Buuuutt....if I configure 2 printers in the Windows Machine:
- Default printer = a local printer
- other printer = the samba printer

And then I select the samba printer manually when I want to print (ms
access reports for example) works well...

strange, huh?

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Here is my $0.02 worth.

In a stand alone machine without any printers installed, MS Access
erports will not work. Basically to view an MSAccess report, it
generates a print preview for which it needs printer drivers. Ofcourse
it the default printer is a samba printer, then it uses the drivers
of that printer.

My guess would be the problem is with the printer drivers, since you
said other programs crash as they try to print. When the default printer
is set to a local printer, then MSAccess uses that driver to generate
a preview so it works without any problem now.

Now is where I am not confident about what I am saying....
But you say that that selecting the Samba printer manually works,
so that means that the samba printer driver does work. So may be
there is some timing or protocol issues.

Hope this helps.

- Murali

David Soler wrote:
> Hello :),
> 
> I have a very strange problem with printers shared via Samba. My
> configuration:
> 
> - A Samba 2.2.8 server under Red Hat 8 as PDC
> - Windows clients 9x/NT/2000/XP
> 
> All work fine: The clients can log into the pdc, access to its
> shares and printers... butt.... in some W2k/XP I realized that
> when a samba printer is configured as the Default PRinter in windows,
> MS ACCESS 2002 can't open the reports. Other programs crash when they
try
> to print.
> 
>  Buuuutt....if I configure 2 printers in the Windows Machine:
> - Default printer = a local printer
> - other printer = the samba printer
> 
> And then I select the samba printer manually when I want to print (ms
> access reports for example) works well...
> 
> strange, huh?