Losing wireless connection between Mac and Office jet pro 8500A plus

[Jon-acintya]

My printer has been successfully set up with my mac but loses wireless connection.

I am running OS X Lion (but the same issue happened with Snow Leopard).

My router is supplied by BT Vision.  Also on the home hub is an apple TV and 3 phone handsets.  I don't know which channels these use and don't know how to find out.

Network configuration page shows no problems but the mac cannot connect to the printer.

Any suggestions please?

[PrintDoc]

It may be a problem with the router, but let's try a couple of things first:

1. Download and install this: support.apple.com/kb/DL907

2. Reset the printing system:

- Go to System Preferences > Print & Scan
- Right (or control) click in the rectangle listing your printers and select Reset Printing System.
WARNING - this will delete ALL of your printers!
- Select the plus sign to re-add a printer. Select the Defualt tab on the top of the window. Look for the printer, select it and wait until the "Add" button becomes available. Click it.

Can you change the router's settings?

[Jon-acintya]

Thanks for the tip but the new HP driver does not show itself in the add printer dialogue box.

Do I need to turn off and on again to enable the printer driver?

Re the router, I'm not sure how to do this.  Could you give me a pointer?

Thanks.

[PrintDoc]

Did you both download AND installl the HP drivers from the Apple site listed above?  Restart your Mac (Apple menu > Restart).  Reset the printing system as described above.

[Jon-acintya]

Yes the software was installed succesfully and mac restarted but when trying to add a new printer only the Adobe PDF is available.

[Jon-acintya]

Update.  I have re-loaded printer driver by connecting printer and mac by ethernet cable.  Works fine in hardwire mode but when cable is disconnected the mac 'cannot find' the printer.

[PrintDoc]

So does the printer still show being connected to the wireless network?  If so, I suspect your router may not support Bonjour printer discovery that your Mac requires.

You could try to connect the printer by IP address.  When you add the printer in System Prefs > Print & Scan, click the '+' sign and then add it under the "IP" tab.  Use the IPP protocol.

[Jon-acintya]

I have tried to connect via IPP with no success.  (I'm using the address listed in the Wireless Network Test Report generated by the printer).

Can you explain how to verify if the printer is still connected to the wireless network?  Under the network tab it gives info only about the homehub itself  as far as I can see.

The printer has previously worked fine, wirelessly with the current router - which has not been changed.

Thanks for your ongoing help!

[PrintDoc · Accepted solution]

If the printer has a valid IP address (not 0.0.0.0 nor 169.254.X.X) then it is still connected to your network.

If your router is a BT HomeHub, you are not alone.  Many, many people on these forums have had troubles with them and most of them I have been unable to help.

The only kill-it-dead solution is to buy a standard router (Linksys or Netgear), attach it to your BT and connect everything to that new router.

[seab]

I have LinkSys but still have dame problem