USB driver for HP DeskJet Portable

I have an old HP DeskJet Portable printer and a new laptop without a parallep port. So I bought ($19) a USB to Parallel printer adapter cable in the hope that I could still keep this printer. Unfortunately, HP driver will not function with the USB connection and HP discontinued this printer many years ago and therefore have not made an updated driver available.

Does anyone have any suggestions or advice to get this to work?

 

If the PC is recognizing the printer, but not printing, try going into the printer properties where you assign it a port and make sure that USB001 is selected. If that doesn't work, try setting it to LPT. I don't remember exactly but I think there's also a virtual LPT port that may work in this scenario. I haven't used one of these cables with a printer in a long time so I don't remember the specifics. With the cable connected to the printer, what happens when you plug the USB end into the PC?

 

The PC does not recognize the printer. The instructions that came with the cable suggested, with the printer turned off, connecting the cable to the PC and the printer, then turning the printer on. Doing this resulted in no recognition of the cable or printer as being something new plugged in.

I did try using the cable on a different and newer printer and the cable does work.

 

OK. Thanks for clearing that up. Does the cable manual or info sheet mention that it has RS232 compatibility? Some of the older parallel (and serial) devices used RS232 but it was phased out with some of the newer parallel (and serial) devices. This is the main reason why most USB>serial adapters don't work, and is probably why the cable isn't working with that particular printer. If the cable does have RS232, then I don't know what to tell you, except maybe plug the cable into the printer (not the PC) and power the printer on, then power the PC on (still w/o the printer connected). Let Windows load completely to the desktop. Then, with the cable attached to the powered on printer, plug it into the PC. If you don't hear the USB recognition sound, the "glonk!", then try launching either the new hardware wizard, or the add-a-printer wizard and see if that gets you anywhere...

Good luck!

(I'm assuming you have XP or Vista)

 

Thanks for the reply. I had to travel out of town this morning for work, but will be home on Friday afternoon. I will check-out the info sheet that came with the cable and also try your other suggestions.