HP printer and router not working together

[djmann02]

I have an HP ENVY 4500e all in one printer which is five years old.  I also have a new Netgear AC1000 router that I recently purchased after my  Netgear nighthawk router went on the fritz.  The router works great.  Using the netgear genie, I can see all of my devices that are connected to my network, including my HP printer.  However, I have three MBP laptops that cannot seem to keep the HP printer in it's settings.  The only way I can reset and add my printer to all of my devices is to manually reboot the router then add the printer to the devices.  This is happening on a daily basis and I just don't know if it is a router issue or an HP issue.  I never had this problem with the previous router.  I need some guidance on what I am doing wrong, if that's even the case.

Any help would be most appreciated!

[Jay_G24]

Hi @djmann02,

Welcome to the HP Support Community. I'd be happy to assist you

Due to the current global COVID-19 situation, we're seeing an influx of customers coming in for support. We appreciate your patience.

Let's try the below steps to see if that helps -

1.) Remove All Barriers: Certain building materials can get in the way of weaker signals like Bluetooth. Metal, bulletproof glass, concrete, and plaster are particularly bad, and marble, plaster and brick aren’t great easy. So if you’re really struggling with interference, your first step should be to move your Bluetooth devices away from these materials. That means no brick walls between you and your devices, and definitely no metal desks!

2.) Change Router Channel: If you have an Apple router and you’re constantly getting interference with your WiFi, try rebooting it. Upon restart, the station will search for a new channel. Specifically, a different channel than the one your Bluetooth devices is using to communicate. If you don’t have an Apple router, you may need to instead go into your router settings and try changing the channel manually. Experiment with different channels to see which one works best.

3.) Move Closer to Your Router: If you often find that you’re getting interference when talking on a wireless headset while on a WiFi call (you’ll know because you’ll hear static), try moving closer to your router. This will give you a more robust WiFi connection, so the Bluetooth frequency can’t overpower it.

4.) Get Away From Microwaves and Fluorescent Lighting: Both emit frequencies of 2.4GHz, and moving away from them will distance you from the source.

I'd like to know the following to isolate the issue further-

1.) Are the printer and Mac connected to the same network?

2.) Is your router dual-band enabled i.e., both 2.4GHz and 5GHz? If yes, make sure the dual band has different SSIDs for 2.4G and 5G networks.

3.) What is the distance between the router and the printer?

4.) Is there an antivirus software installed on your Mac?

5.) Could you perform a ping test using the Mac Network Utility and let me know the results? Use the printer IP address to perform a ping test, the printer IP can be located by selecting the wireless icon on the printer display.

The wireless status menu on your Mac should also give us quite a lot of information that would help us identify the issue. You can press and hold option-click the WiFi icon and then use shift-command-5 to take the screenshot. Press the space bar when the icon turns into a camera. Share the ping test results and the screenshot with us.

Also, check with your Internet service provider if your router is able to forward 'Bonjour packets'.  Bonjour locates devices such as printers, other computers, and the services that those devices offer on a local network using multicast Domain Name System (mDNS) service records. The software comes built-in with Apple's macOS and iOS operating systems. 

Hope this helps! Keep me posted. 

Please click “Accept as Solution” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution.

Click the “Kudos, Thumbs Up" on the bottom right to say “Thanks” for helping!

Have a great day! 

[djmann02]

Thanks for getting back to me.  I will do my best to answer your questions to help further diagnose this issue as well as give you some new discoveries

1.) Are the printer and Mac connected to the same network?  YES

2.) Is your router dual-band enabled i.e., both 2.4GHz and 5GHz? If yes, make sure the dual band has different SSIDs for 2.4G and 5G networks.  YES

3.) What is the distance between the router and the printer?  12 inches

4.) Is there an antivirus software installed on your Mac?  NO

5.) Could you perform a ping test using the Mac Network Utility and let me know the results? Use the printer IP address to perform a ping test, the printer IP can be located by selecting the wireless icon on the printer display.

PING 192.168.1.6 (192.168.1.6): 56 data bytes

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=20.975 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=37.059 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=49.474 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=32.529 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=4.818 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=5 ttl=255 time=31.819 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=6 ttl=255 time=4.704 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=7 ttl=255 time=19.526 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=8 ttl=255 time=14.536 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=9 ttl=255 time=29.685 ms

--- 192.168.1.6 ping statistics ---

10 packets transmitted, 10 packets received, 0.0% packet loss

round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 4.704/24.513/49.474/13.572 ms

I can manually enter the IP address for the printer to my MBPs and it will print but will not scan.  None of my devices detect the printer over the wifi.  Netgear genie shows the printer icon with the correct IP address and the blue light is solid on the printer.  The printer and my wifi and printer  are on the same channel.  I have tried using the HP Smart app on my iPhone and it does not detect a wireless printer either.

Hope this helps.  I am at a loss at this point.  But again, I am a novice with all of this.  Any future thoughts or ideas are welcome!

[djmann02]

1.) Are the printer and Mac connected to the same network?  YES

2.) Is your router dual-band enabled i.e., both 2.4GHz and 5GHz? If yes, make sure the dual band has different SSIDs for 2.4G and 5G networks.  YES

3.) What is the distance between the router and the printer?  12 inches

4.) Is there an antivirus software installed on your Mac?  none

5.) Could you perform a ping test using the Mac Network Utility and let me know the results? Use the printer IP address to perform a ping test, the printer IP can be located by selecting the wireless icon on the printer display.

PING 192.168.1.6 (192.168.1.6): 56 data bytes

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=28.298 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=16.068 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=23.792 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=3 ttl=255 time=24.873 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=3.744 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=5 ttl=255 time=26.625 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=6 ttl=255 time=22.942 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=7 ttl=255 time=22.565 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=8 ttl=255 time=21.920 ms

64 bytes from 192.168.1.6: icmp_seq=9 ttl=255 time=20.936 ms

--- 192.168.1.6 ping statistics ---

10 packets transmitted, 10 packets received, 0.0% packet loss

round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 3.744/21.176/28.298/6.607 ms

Also, when I try using my HP Utility app, the app will not connect with my printer.  The printer is on the network but is not detectible by any devices or apps.

[Jay_G24]

Does your 2.4GHz network and your 5GHz network have the same network name/SSID?

Make sure all your devices are connected to 2.4GHz network, as the print cannot connect to 5GHz  network.