mkennedy

hi.
i was wondering if anyone could help me out.

i recently bought a hp pavilion dv 1448ea laptop but my old lexmark z35 printer doesn't work with it.

what happens is i install the driver for the printer and it works the first couple of times i plug in the usb cable. however any time i try to use it after that i get an error message saying "cannot communicate with the printer, check if its turned on etc".

btw i never had much problem using this printer with my old dell laptop (with which it was originally bundled).

incidentally, on a separate issue, i also have a usb bluetooth adaptor which doesn't work with the new hp laptop (e.g i can't connect my bluetooth enabled pda to my laptop via the adaptor). again, this adaptor also worked well with my old dell laptop.

i have contacted hp tech support about these issues and apart from some feeble advice about uninstalling usb host controllers in hardware manager they have been virtually useless and plain unhelpful. eventually they told me to do a re-install which i did. 4 hours later i am in the same boat, no difference whatsoever.

i got back on to them today and they tell me that the laptop and printer are "incompatible" and do not offer any explanation for this incompatibility. just another one of life's big mysteries, obviously.
obviously, they tell me to get on to lexmark as well to find out what this incompatibility issue is.

anyway, can anyone tell me if this mysterious INCOMPATIBILITY between laptops and printers is common. it seems a bit incredible to me that i can't use a standard printer with a standard laptop.

btw i'm not too bothered by the fact that the bluetooth adaptor doesn't work with the laptop tbh but a bloody printer. wtf.

the only thing i can think of is given the fact that the printer was originally bundled with my old dell laptop, would this mean that it would be only functional with my this laptop.

anyway, i would appreciate if anyone can shed some light on this issue. or maybe just let me know if this unresolvable incompatibilty issue is common and whether tech support have done all they can. or maybe if someone could tell me where i could get a list of incompatible printers for hp laptops (if such a thing exists) so i don't buy another printer that's no good to me. (btw, hp were again unhelpful regarding this).

any help much appreciated.
thanks.

mkennedy

hi.
just figured out what the problem is. turns out i have to load the lexmark driver for each individual port for some strange reason.

still can't get my usb bluetooth dongle to work with the laptop to sync via bluetooth though.

DavesPPC

Sorry that nobody was able to assist you, but am glad that you solved the printer problem yourself!
Any luck with the BlueTooth?

__________________
New Horizon H.I.

mkennedy

Originally Posted by DavesPPC

Sorry that nobody was able to assist you, but am glad that you solved the printer problem yourself! Any luck with the BlueTooth?

nope.
still can't connect my pda to my laptop via bluetooth.

i actually have 2 bluetooth adaptors at this stage neither of which work with the laptop.

i pretty much have the same problem with both:
i've installed the bluetooth driver and the pda and laptop seem to recognise each other but that's about it. i can't use activesync or transfer files at all. (btw this is the case with my phone as well).

also the bluetooth icon on the desktop seems to be disabled ie if i click on it it doesn't do anything: what does this mean?

btw regarding my lexmark printer problem:
i have a good mind to get back to hp tech support and tell them the incompatability suggestion they made was a load of ****.

somehow though i still suspect that if i ask them for help with the bluetooth adaptor problem i'd still get the same obtuse "incompatability" excuse for support from them...

Julie

I have an HP Pavilion dv2035us and my Kensington bluetooth dongle works just fine with it. The only thing is I have to always use it in the same USB port. It seems that the USB port I used when I first installed the drivers and set everything up is the only USB port that the dongle works with...unless of course, I reinstall the drivers again and set everything up again with the different USB port.

julie

__________________