I have a new Intel iMac. I have installed latest version of Parallels and Vitsa Basic Ed. Installed printer drivers for HP Photosmart 3210, which is connected via USB. When I launch Vista, the printer is not automatically connected (even though I have selected Auto connection in the USB options), so I have to go to the devices menu and select the USB printer. When I close down the VM, this setting is lost. Surely, this is not the way it was intended to be? Am I missing something obvious? Any help/advice would be really appreciated.
Hello, FYI, due to Microsoft's regulations and EULA, users cannot install Windows Vista Home Basic Edition and Windows Vista Home Premium on any kind of virtual hardware, which of course includes Parallels Desktop's virtual machines. Best regards, Mike
Hi Mike, Thanks for the note. Like most people I have not read (and do not read) the detail of any EULA's and I was certianly not aware (probably like 99.9% of people) that there was such a restriction with VISTA. After having spent some £200 on Windows I will run it in a VM and I really don't care what MS think. This is exactly (and this is not getting at you at all) the kind of rubbish that MS do and is a totally unnessary restriction on the end user. Thx Edward
To your original question: I think that your USB printing function is working as designed. In essence, you are unplugging your USB printer from your MAC and plugging it into the VM. You can only use it on one machine at a time. I think this is because the drivers are different between the OSX and Vista. There is another solution called Bonjour for Windows. Conceptually, your printer is attached full-time to your MAC OSX system, and you allow printer sharing. In essence your Mac becomes a print server. You run Bonjour for Windows in your VM. Bonjour connects to your printer as a network printer rather than through USB. With the Bonjour solution, you don't have to worry about disconnecting and reconnecting your printer. And both the Mac and the VM can send jobs to the print queue at the same time. On the other hand, by using the USB method, you may (or may not) get a better driver. If you decide to try Bonjour, do a search on these forums and you will find many threads on it.
