Naming Printers

By | 2007-02-26

Be careful naming your printers if you want to be able to manage them!

Ever deployed a printer and then tried to open its properties from the print server and found the Security tab missing or some of the buttons on the property sheet not working? You may have given your new printer a name that contains a reserved name. Windows reserves the following words as special names: CON, NUL, PRN, COM1 to COM9, and LPT1 to LPT9. So if you name your new printer PRN.5 then you”re in trouble! You”ll have to change your printer”s name, and your client computers will need to uninstall and then reinstall the printer connection again on these machines. Bottom line is, never use a reserved name for naming a printer, a file, or anything else in Windows.

Author: dwirch

Derek Wirch is a seasoned IT professional with an impressive career dating back to 1986. He brings a wealth of knowledge and hands-on experience that is invaluable to those embarking on their journey in the tech industry.

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