DHCP and Printers

Simon Hobson dhcp1 at thehobsons.co.uk
Tue Dec 12 20:00:50 UTC 2006


Diego, Emil wrote:
>I am running DHCP 3.0.5 on fedora core 4.  I have about 30 network
>printers ranging from HP JetDirect boxes to Lanier printers.  I have
>setup the DHCP server to assign an IP address to the printer, but I am
>running into a problem.  It seems that some of the printers never
>acknowledge the IP sent to them from the DHCP server and then tries to
>request the ip over and over again. 
>
>Here is some of the dhcp server log for the MAC address of one of my
>printers.
>Dec 11 10:55:22 moya dhcpd: DHCPDISCOVER from 00:00:74:b2:53:64 via eth0
>Dec 11 10:55:22 moya dhcpd: DHCPOFFER on 10.39.5.53 to 00:00:74:b2:53:64
>via eth0
>Dec 11 10:55:24 moya dhcpd: DHCPDISCOVER from 00:00:74:b2:53:64 via eth0
>Dec 11 10:55:24 moya dhcpd: DHCPOFFER on 10.39.5.53 to 00:00:74:b2:53:64
>via eth0

It's impossible to tell - if only you could look at the non existent 
logs in the printer and see what reason it gives :-(

First thing would be to analyse the packets and see what options the 
printer requests - and make sure you supply everything it asks for. 
Beyond that it's guesswork !

I once had a printer (RIP attached to a Minolta copier) that didn't 
request the subnet mask, but even when I hard coded the options list 
for that device it still didn't accept a lease offer. It was a few 
years later (well after I'd given up and manually configured it) that 
I accidentally found a tech note that it won't accept a lease shorter 
than two years - yes TWO YEARS ! You have to wonder what some people 
are thinking ? Of all the things I'd considered, I'd never thought of 
that.


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