Solution: Printing in Windows Guest with v3.0

I thought I would post this in order to help anyone that encounter this situation. There are many factors that can cause a printing issue, so I am going to outline the setup:

• Parallels Desktop v3.0
• Using Parallel Port Option
• Using USB Connected Printer
• Printer does not appear in Windows Explorer
• -OR: "Win32 error code returned by the print processor: 2." in Event Log

Try the following:

• Configure the virtual machine to Autoconnect USB to the Guest OS
• After this, if the printer is not appearing in Windows Explorer (Start->Settings->Printers), reinstall Parallel Tools
• If the printer is appearing, but you cannot print and get the message listed above in the Event Log, open up Device Manager. Check to see if there is an exclaimation by the LPT1 listing. If it is, go to properties for the item. You may see a message stating the drivers are not installed for the device. If this is the case, click the Update Driver button. Select search for recommended driver option and make sure the Windows Update checkbox is selected for places to look for drivers. After Windows contacts Windows Update, it should find that MSPORTS is the best suited driver. Once installed, the Device Manager will be updated.

You should now be able to print, if the specific conditions listed above affect you. Hope this information helps someone out.

 

Just curious - does Bonjour figure in to any of this? Could it?

 

I think that is all about hard wiring the USB printer to Windows. Bonjour is only relevant if you want to find and connect to shared printers.

 

Or print from the host and the guest at the same time without conflict.

 

I have two printers:

An Epson C86 connected to my iMac's USB port
A Brother MFC-4800 connected to my Airport extreme's USB port

I can print to Epson from my VM without Bonjour simply by selecting that printer in my Parallels device menu and then selecting the Epson in whatever application I want to print from.

However I need Bonjour to print from my VM to my Brother MFC. For whatever reason the VM could not find it otherwise.

Both printers print from OS X without special configuration in my Mac's Printer Setup utility (other than simply "add printer", and entry of my Brother MFC's Airport's IP address).