Older printer cannot connect to Hub 5

[Stratman]

I had a Hub 5 'forced' upon me yesterday (copper wire phones being made obsolete). I managed to connecr everything to WiFi except my Samsung ML-2525W printer. Its connection setup keeps reporting it has failed due to invalid security, or variations thereof. The printer offers for Authentication:- Open, Shared, WPA, WPA2, and for Encryption:- None, AES, TKIP+AES. No combination of these will allow it to connect to the Hub 5, which offers Disabled, WPA2-PSK, WPA3-SAE and WPA2-PSK/WPA3-SAE

The Hub 5 is set to WPA2-PSK, 2.4GHz only (5GHz seriously interferes with our Freeview signal but that's a different problem!), so I have a horrible feeling my perfectly serviceable printer cannot offer sufficient security for Hub 5. Is this correct, or is there a workaround? I really don't want to have to buy a new printer

[goslow]

Printer should be set to WPA2 and AES. Hub set to WPA2-PSK.

There are a few admin/config utility programs here which allow you to do the setup manually

https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/samsung-ml-2525-laser-printer-series/model/17156815

It is best to do the setup with the printer connected by ethernet or plugged into a laptop by USB then enter the necessary wi-fi info for the printer via the utility program

I have found that using the utility programs to do the wi-fi setup for wireless printers that will not connect can often get them working.

[Client62]

Are you following a process like this ...

Samsung Printer Setup

[Stratman]

Thanks for the replies. Sadly, they are exactly what I've been trying to do. I used Samsung's own 'Easy Wireless Setup' utility (both from the installation CD and from the Samsung/HP website), connected to my laptop via USB, and WPA2 and AES was set many many times, none of which worked. The printer sat happily connected to my Hub 2 for many years, it looks like Hub 5 isn't as backwards compatible as I had hoped.

Perhaps a future update may change this?

[Stratman]

Oops. it looks like I've replied to myself :embarassed emoji thingy

Apologies.

[goslow]

Have you done a full factory reset on the printer before trying to connect to the Hub 5? I have sometimes found that a printer will not fully accept new network connections if it retains any trace of a previous setup.

Does the printer have an ethernet socket on it? Have you tried an ethernet connection, just for the purposes of testing, that you can get a network connection of any kind on the Hub 5? Would a wired ethernet connection be an option or wired ethernet via powerline?

[Client62]

https://www.cnet.com/products/samsung-ml-2525w/specs/

From the specs above this printer does appear to have network port, if possible that will be the most stable connection.

The printer's Wi-Fi is listed as 802.11 B & G i.e. 2.4GHz only and from some time ago,

I suspect the problem is the printer's 802.11B/G WI-Fi is not compatible with the VM Hub 5 that has Wi-Fi 6 / 802.11ax which is 3 generations later.

Several other customers have been in this situation have solved the Wi-Fi problem by using an RE450/AC1750 wireless repeater to provide Wi-Fi 4 and Wi-Fi 5 service which is much more compatible with older equipment. A similar task could be achieved with a 2.4GHz Wireless Access point. 

You are quite right the Hub 5 does lack backward compatibility with older 2.4GHz Wi-Fi devices it also appears to lack support for 10Mb/s Ethernet devices, a 10/100 Network Switch can solve that latter issue.

[Stratman]

Thanks again for all the replies.

The printer works via USB, so that's how it'll be used from now on. I'm sure the router and printer are talking to each other as the error message is one of 'Invalid Security' and not 'Cannot Find SSID', which came up when I deliberately turned off wifi for testing purposes. I tried enabling b/g/n/ax (default is g/n/ax) but it made no difference.

I think I've invested as much time as I'm going to trying to get it working, as I said earlier it works on USB so at least I can print.

Thanks to everyone who replied.