HP Photosmart Plus B209a-m will not configure for wireless in Mountain Lion

[Dale_R]

Due to a power outage, my network settings were changed, rendering the printer disfunctional unless used with a USB connection. The last time I successfully set up the printer was before the Mountain Lion update, and it had worked fine until now. In the HP Setup Assistant, my printer shows up in the list as a USB connected printer, however when I try to configure it to a wireless network, the "Device Not Connected" error message appears, telling me to temporarily connect the printer via USB, even though it is already connected. Please help!!

Much Appreciated,

Dale

[Cloud_Strider]

It sounds like the software is not functioning properly or reading the Mac printing system properly.

Reset the Mac printing system using the exact steps in this document from HP.  Resetting the printing system will remove any printers installed.  If you have more than just this one printer, they will also need to be installed again.

Once that is done, install this driver.  The driver has your printer listed as supported for Mountain Lion.

This should clear the printing system as if the printer was having a clean install.  Try to install it again with the network option.

[Dale_R]

Unfortunately, the same dialogue box appeared when I completed your steps to reinstall the drivers. I tried it twice, once without restarting my computer and once with a restart.

[dmehta]

I have the exact same problem, and it began today - that could have been a screenshot I took! Any help will be most appreciated. 

[Cloud_Strider]

By chance, was the USB cable already connected before the installation was started?

The error you are receiving can be triggered if the USB cable was already connected at the start of the installation.  If it was, try resetting the printing system again and make sure the USB cable to the printer is disconnected.

[Dale_R]

The USB cable has to be connected in order for the printer to show up in the devices list, otherwise I cannot install the printer. I have tried with two different USB cables and it still didn't work.

[Cloud_Strider]

The USB cable would be required for Apple Software Update to find it, but the direct download provided earlier should eliminate that requirement.

The printer installation software is written in a way that it will not work when the USB cable is already connected as connecting the USB cable triggers a system event that the software is looking for.

Please try to install the software from the direct download provided earlier starting with the USB cable disconnected until prompted for it. 

In the mean time, I will research this issue further as the requirement you stated is not supposed to be like that with the direct download.

EDIT--------------------------

I downloaded the Apple HP Printer Driver package I linked you to earlier.

I used a USB printer that is listed in the same package as the 209a.

I installed the driver package without the USB cable connected without an issue.  In fact, the package did not prompt me for the printer to be connected at all at this point.

I next connected the USB cable and went to Print and Scan.

Here, I clicked on the + sign to add a printer.  My printer was listed and I selected.  It added the printer without any issue with leaving the USB cable disconnected until after the driver package was installed.

I am not certain why your OS X 10.8 system is behaving very very differently, but I will certainly look into this further to see what options are available.

[dmehta]

Thanks very much, Cloud_Strider. I followed all your steps and the printer works with the USB connection - i can print when my macbook is connected to it via USB.  However it is unable to detect Wireless network - when I click the Wireless setting I get an error that it is not connected.

Just to recap steps I took:

Downloaded the Apple HP Printer Driver package u linked to earlier.

I used a USB printer that is listed in the same package as the 209a.

I installed the driver package without the USB cable connected without an issue.  In fact, the package did not prompt me for the printer to be connected at all at this point.

I next connected the USB cable and went to Print and Scan.

Here, I clicked on the + sign to add a printer.  My printer was listed and I selected.

When I disconnected the USB cable - that printer connection I added shows OFFLINE and doesn't print wirelessly 😞

[Dale_R]

I reinstalled the driver without the USB cable and the printer works fine when connected to the computer via USB. The problem is still getting it to work on a wireless network using the HP Setup Assistant. I am still prompted to connect the printer with a USB cable even though it is connected already.

[Cloud_Strider]

With two users with the same printer and OS X 10.8, it would seem the issue may be with Apple's driver package they put together.  I rechecked HP's site and the site does not have an office OS X 10.8 driver package and advises to use the package available through Apple Software Update.  This has been tried with the direct download and through Apple Software Update and it is not working.  I asked my colleagues and it seems that this could be an issue with that specific printer and 10.8.

There may be a way to bypass this issue.  Is there any wireless computer or mobile device (iPad, iPhone, etc.) that could be taken off the wireless network momentarily?  This seems like an odd question, but the printer can be added to the network manually using an ad-hoc connection which bypasses the software USB to wireless setup.