Printer unable to get an IP address from EE Smart Router

[JamieDow]

Hi,

I'm trying to configure a Samsung printer (Xpress M2825ND) - wired (NOT wireless) - so that it will be given an IP address by the DCHP on the EE Smart Router. No matter what options I try, it doesn't seem to work. I've tried.

1. Setting the printer to Automatic assignment of IP via DCHP (both with and without "Auto IP" ticked).
2. Setting the printer to Manual assignment of IP - specifying an IP within the range assigned by the router, and I've tried with an IP outsider that range. I've always set the default gateway to 192.168.1.254, the address of the router.
3. I've attempted to set the router to fix the IP of the printer as some particular IP address matching the IP I've set at the printer end, but to no avail. The router doesn't seem to want to assign the printer anything other than weird things like 169.254.160.170 -- addresses that seem to come (somehow!) from the printer itself: the printer seems incapable of accepting an IP address it is assigned by the router.

Can anyone please help?

I've had some excellent tech brains on this (albeit those not specifically familiar with EE's router), and we've drawn a blank.

Cheers,

Jamie

[XRaySpeX]

169.254... IPs are known as Link Local addys & are reserved for that purpose when a device can't obtain an IP normally:

NetRange: 169.254.0.0 - 169.254.255.255
CIDR: 169.254.0.0/16
NetName: LINKLOCAL-RFC3927-IANA-RESERVED
NetHandle: NET-169-254-0-0-1
Parent: NET169 (NET-169-0-0-0-0)
NetType: IANA Special Use
OriginAS:
Organization: Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA)
RegDate: 1998-01-27
Updated: 2014-01-09
Comment: Computers use addresses starting with "169.254." when they do not have a manually configured address or when they are not told which address to use by a service on the network. They are commonly called the "link local" addresses. Routers are not allowed to forward packets sent from an IPv4 "link local" address, so they are always used by a directly connected device. These addresses were assigned by the IETF, the organization that develops Internet protocols, in the Standards Track document, RFC3927, which can be found at: http://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc3927

---

[JamieDow]

Even immediately after a factory reset of the printer, and having it startup from that reset plugged into the router .... the router is still not able to detect the printer and supply it with an IP address, nor is it capable of recognising a fixed IP address set using the printer interface.

The router ("smart router") seems perfectly capable of dishing out IP addresses to all other devices (laptops, mobiles, Nintendo Wii, Samsung smart TV, etc) but apparently not to this printer. I can't work out why.

[JamieDow]

That seems to repeat what I've found out.

But both your comment and mine highlight that the relevant questions are:

• Is the printer failing to present itself properly across the network to the DCHP server, and so fails to be assigned an IP?
• Is the DCHP somehow (despite the printer's correctly presenting itself) failing to assign an IP to the printer (or fails to do so in a way that is intelligible to the printer?).

What I have established is that these issues have nothing to do with the way the printer is connected. It successfully talks to the laptop when directly connected to one another. It fails to talk to the router in the required way even when directly connected by an ethernet cable.

[XRaySpeX]

Have you tried connecting by WPS & seeing if that gets a valid IP from the router's DHCP?

[JamieDow]

I haven't. I don't know much about WPS but from what I have found out just now it looks like it only applies to wireless network printers (the Samsung M2825ND is wired only). But if there was some way of triggering the DCHP server to assign an IP, that would be exactly what we'd want.

[XRaySpeX]

Ah, OK! What I asked only applies to wireless enabled printers.

Just to check & clarify would you post an image of the printer's IP Configuration (TCP/IPv4) settings when you want the router's DHCP to assign an IP to it?

[JamieDow]

Here you go. Because the printer has no display panel, and only 4 buttons, this is what one has to use to configure it, which is a pest, because in order to access this control panel, the printer has to have an IP address! So, I'm forever switching the ethernet cables about in order to connect directly to the printer and use whatever IP address (typically 169.254...) it has given itself. Anyway, these are the settings that I think should be correct:  Auto + DHCP + AutoIP.
(The greyed out figures are what I'd previously set it to, in order yet again to try and see if it could force the router to recognise a static IP set at the printer (client) end. No joy there, as usual.)

Is it possible that the router is not getting the broadcast messages sent by the printer as the first stage in the DHCP process? If not, why not? .... 

[XRaySpeX]

What happens if you take off Auto IP? It's already set as Automatically DHCP.

[JamieDow]

Yeah. As you might suspect, I've tried that. The result is no different.

My sense is that the printer perhaps has a problem undertaking DHCP processes. OR that the router somehow takes exception to what the printer does in DHCP in ways that it doesn't with other devices (which seem to have no problems establishing an IP).

I've been trying to see whether I can upgrade the firmware on the printer. There is some possible indication of DHCP / IP issues in the release notes for firmware that HP sent me, but (a) I haven't been able successfully to install the firmware they sent me; and (b) it's not clear whether that firmware is actually newer / better than the currently installed firmware. The installation has failed when attempted via the web browser interface (which does have a process for upgrading firmware). There is a USB-based method, but it requires a Windoze computer, and I don't have one (all Linux here).