Networks Photocopiers & Networks

I have been asked by my boss to install the entire network for a new office that we will be setting up in the next couple of weeks. Most of it is strait forward; network cables for computers, a VoIP phone system (which I think I have figured out what I need to do for it). The bits that are giving me a headache are: the video conferencing system, although I cannot do anything about that until I can put all of the parts of it together and try and figure out how that works, and how to connect the photocopier.

The reason for stating this thread is how am I going to setup the photocopier. Normally this would be a piece of cake, but how my boss wants it setup in this office has thrown me a bit.

The Situation

There will be two networks & internet connections in the office; one for us and one for the client. The network for us will be linked to our corporate network, using a Cisco 800 series and there will be approximately 20 computers linked to it. To this I will have almost no access to the settings. The network for the client will be an open network, using an US Robotics router, with approximately 10 computers linked to it. I should have full access to all of the settings on this.

The Problem

The single Canon iRC4080i photocopier is to be used to print and scan by people on both networks, and this is what has thrown me. The photocopier can only be plugged into one network at a time, and switching it over every time someone needs to print would not be practical.

My Possible Solution

I was thinking of connecting the photocopier to the client network, and then setting up some form of port forwarding on the router for printing from our network, but I don’t know if it would work and I don’t think that it would allow us to scan documents in.

Before anyone says it; I would prefer not to have to speak to our IT department, you have no idea how inept they are. I am not in the IT department, but because I know a tiny bit about computers, I get given all of the IT problems by my boss and asked to sort them.

Do any of you guys have any suggestions as to how would be best to set the photocopier up to print and scan so people on both networks can used it? I am not sure that it is important, but the budget for this setup is zero, anything I need, I have to beg, borrow, or steal.

Many thanks
John

 

how are your network and the clients network connected? (is there a connection at all?)

 

It sounds like you need a print server that can service both networks. I have never had to use one for 2 seperate LANs but there must be a product that can do this.

 

You'd need a router between the networks with rules & ACL's restricting access etc.

 

Not being funny but why arn't you getting IT to do if if that's their job?

 

you just need to set up the photo copier in the client network, give the cisco 800 series router an interface on a separate vlan in the client network. set the photo copier to use the cisco 800 as its defualt gateway, and then your office network will have access to the photo copier as the cisco will route traffic to the client network and nothing on the client network will be able to connect to the office network as they won't have the cisco 800 as there default gateway.

Not the most secure way to set this up (as if a device on the client network set the cisco 800 as its defualt gateway it would also have access to your office network) but it is pretty simple (if your at all familiar with setting up cisco routers).

 

An ACL would lock that down.

Just get IT to do it

 

There is no connection between the two networks at all, each has its own BT line for the connection to the internet.

Sorry, can you explain this in a little bit more detail. I am not sure how this would be implemented. I don't have any more experience than setting up home routers.

Let me explain (apologies about the rant)

There are currently 3 levels of IT support at the company I work for.
Level 1 – takes down details of problems, and resets passwords.
Level 2 – deals with any problems level 1 cannot, and level 3 deals with anything level 2 cannot.
If the people at level 3 cannot deal with it, then it goes out to Fujitsu to solve.

Example 1
About a month ago I had to help a colleague reset his password (he has a written piece of paper with written step by step instructions on how to log in and access his emails). The person at level 1 could not find his account, despite me giving his name, his email address, the part of the company he works for, his job title, the domain he was on. So it got transferred to level 2, that guy understood the problem and claimed he was able to find the account but did not have permission to access it, so it got transferred to level 3. The person at level 3 reset my password (not what I had asked to be done) and reset the password of someone in the company with the same name as the guy I was trying to help. After two weeks it got elevated to the Fujitsu support, after I explained the same information to this guy as I had all of the others, he reset the password in less than a minute.

Example 2
I have a problem with another photo copier at another one of our offices, where there is only the client network there, but they cannot print to the photocopier. Our IT department has been dodging the problem for the last 4 months, they won’t even respond to my phone calls and emails about it anymore.

I have many more examples of what our IT department is like, but I won’t bore you with them.

I did try asking a guy that was sent out from the Fujitsu support if he knew how to set up the photocopier to print and scan for two networks, but he didn’t, he just said that normally they would use 2 photocopiers, one for us, and one for the client.

Unfortunately I am not familiar with setting up Cisco routers. What you have suggested does sound interesting/promising, however, if I have understood what you have written correctly, I would have to set up a vlan using the client's router. I doubt that the router that will be provided would be capable of handling a vlan.

 

ACL is access control list - you just need a route between the networks with rules and an ACL - hard to explain to someone who isn't in IT, but it's not that hard if you work in IT.

Some of my clients have a set up that is just like this - and I just have a route on the firewall that send the traffic over to the other network, it's locked down to just go to the printer and use the ports the printer uses and then there is an ACL that controls who can use this route - this is on fortinet routers not cisco, but I could set the same thing up on a cisco system.

 

I have just spoken to a guy who is in the office today, and he has got me the model numbers, I don't know if it will help.

Cisco 887VA - I just had a look at the manual, and it all looks very complicated
US Robotics Modem 3453B - obviously this is not going to be the router for the client network, since it is a dial up modem.

 

you only need to set up 2 vlans on the cisco nothing else needs to be aware of vlans for it to work, however if your not familiar with cisco routers you not going to get far with the cisco 800 unless your up for some playing around as the graphical interface for the cisco is somewhere between limited and useless (if its even installed) if you don't know what your doing. The CLI (command line interface) is not that complicated but it does take some learning/playing to get started with.

 

I've actually done this before and there is a really simple cheeky way of getting this to work

Use the inbuilt network port for one network. Then use a USB Print Server for the other network. I used a HP JetDirect en3700 before but I'm sure cheaper options work fine also.

You will have total physical isolation between the networks so data security is not an issue, and both parties will be able to print to the same device.

Very much a KISS solution!

 

I like Atomic's solution for KISS - can't see an issue with it although it's not the most elegant. The full fat ACL/VLAN solution already suggested would be my preferred option, you're going to end up at 3rd line IT for that though by the sounds.

 

My solution is far from the elegant haha, but it was quick to setup and was way cheaper than getting their outsourced network support involved!

 

Simple to setup and, more importantly, simple to fault find if any arise.

Although, it would only offer the ability to print, not scan.. I think?

Btw, I have to deal with Fujitsu UK and Europe for pretty much everything now :-/ It's frustrating as I used to fix and administer everything and now my hands are very much tied with red tape.

 

Ah, the client only used 'scan to email' so a single scan config was not a problem there. If network scanning is needed that might be an issue with my suggestion.

 

First of all, sorry about the thread revival.

After many months of arguing with the IT department, even to the point of regional managing directors getting involved, and telling the IT department to set up the photocopier so that both networks can print to in, and getting no where. I have decided to try Atomic's suggestion.

I have set up a raspberry pi as a print server using CUPS, which I have tested and been able to print to, however something very strange happens. Every time I try and print a document; the first page is blank, except for a few strange characters (smiley faces and such), the second page is completely blank, then it prints the document perfectly, the next page is completely blank, and then it prints one final page just like the first.

Apart from being a bit wasteful and annoying, it works perfectly. However does anyone have any ideas as to how to prevent the superfluous pages from being printed?

 

If it was a Windows print server I'd say the print job was corrupt or there is an issue with the print spooler, can't help with CUPS as it's not something I support.

 

Spurious characters and pages can be indicative of a driver issue - I'd check that you have the appropriate ones for your printer installed on the print server.

I'm not an expert on CUPS either, but it would be where I'd look first

 

I originally selected a similar model photocopier from the list of default printers provided with CUPS, and I got the results I mentioned above. I, like you suspected I had a bad driver. So after some searching, I found a PPD file that is supposed to be for the correct photocopier. This gave me the same results, I also tried a few other of the default drivers provided with CUPS, but they all gave the same results.

After this I am completely out of ideas.