Installing Cross Platform Print Drivers in Windows NT 4.0

ID: Q154291

The information in this article applies to:

SUMMARY

Windows NT supports the central installation of printer drivers for various client platforms. These include MIPS, Alpha, Power PC, and also Windows 95 clients. This article describes how to do this for Windows NT 4.0.

For information about the correct process for Windows NT 3.x, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q100346Cross Platform Network Printing with Windows NT


MORE INFORMATION

The process has been simplified in Windows NT 4.0. After installing a shared printer in Windows NT 4.0, you can add additional platform drivers by following these steps:

  1. Double-click the My Computer icon.


  2. Double-click the Printers icon.


  3. Right-click the printer icon and click Properties.


  4. Click the Sharing tab.


  5. In the Alternate Drivers box, you will see a list of various versions and platforms of Windows NT as well as Windows 95. Any driver that is already installed will be marked as such.


  6. Click the platform of the driver you wish to add and click OK.


  7. You will be prompted for the path to the appropriate driver.


  8. You should now see the driver being copied onto the server.


  9. In the case of Windows 95 drivers, you will either need to point the server to the Windows directory of an existing computer running Windows 95 that has that print driver already loaded, or you can do the following:


    1. Extract the Windows 95 cabinet files into a location accessible to the Windows NT server. The cabinet files needed are Precopy2.cab, Win95_09.cab, and Win95_10.cab.


    2. Presuming that your Windows 95 compact disc is in drive D, and you are extracting the files to a directory called C:\w95print, the commands to do this are:
      
      i.    c:
      ii.   md \w95print
      iii.  cd \w95print
      iv.   d:\win95\extract.exe /e d:\win95\precopy2.cab *.*
      v.    d:\win95\extract.exe /e d:\win95\win95_09.cab *.*
      vi.   d:\win95\extract.exe /e d:\win95\win95_10.cab *.*


    3. Use c:\w95print as the path to load the Windows 95 drivers. When you view this directory, there will be 116 .inf files and you will need to select the correct one. To view a list of the printer drivers, point to the Msprint.inf file.

      NOTE: You may also be prompted for the files from Win95_11.cab or Win95_06.cab, depending on the Windows 95 installation source and which printer is being installed. If so, use the following commands to extract the files to the same location as above:
      d:\win95\extract.exe /e d:\win95\win95_11.cab *.*
      d:\win95\extract.exe /e d:\win95\win95_06.cab *.*


Additional query words: prodnt win95 


Keywords          : kbprint nthowto ntprint 
Version           : WinNT:4.0
Platform          : winnt 
Issue type        : kbhowto kbinfo

Last Reviewed: February 25, 1999