TP-LINK TL-WPS510U Single USB 2.0 Port Wireless Print Server

A very small box which works perfectly once it is correctly configured. Setup and configuration under windows 10 however is quite a nightmare, as the TP-Link setup wizard won't work and the print server can't be accessed on a win 10 computer due to the fact that the print server's default setting uses an ad hoc network configuration which windows 10 won't see. So I had to do the setup manually through a smart phone...

Unless you are fortunate enough to have a wireless network for which the default IP address is OK (192.168.0.1) then this device is impossible to set up under Windows10. It should not be on sale in this day and age! Fortunately I could use my wife's iPhone (!) to connect to it and edit the default IP address and get it to connect on my wireless network. Instructions for this are on the TP-Link website and, whilst correct, need to be followed exactly: [...] Once the server address had been changed and it was set to "Infrastructure" network type then the installation wizard could find it and install the printer. This also reduced the temperature of the device as well, so it must have been using a lot of power in "ad hoc" networking mode with nothing connected. One thing to note though. On the "site survey" it showed my router as using WPA security, which seemed a bit odd, but WPA-PSK didn't work when I tried to enter the password, with either type of encryption. It needed WPA2-PSK and AES (CCMP) encryption to be selected, then it connected to the wireless network after a power cycle.

Contrary to previous reviews I'd say this is actually a pretty good product - the only potential issue may be that you need to know what to do regarding wireless networks. Seeing the negative feedback and talking to people I was told/read that the main issue is that the Print Server starts off within a certain IP range - and that was the key issue with most consumers. The current documentation (I got version 2 of the product) was revised to reflect that point. In my case this proved no issue - using Vista - I am sure Win7 will be similar - one can directly connect to the Print Server over via in an Ad-Hoc network - using the setup CD it is possible to then change the settings according to your router's Wi-Fi setup - knowing the settings of your router is advantageous here. (Encryption type, authentication type, Network SSID and Password) Having done that the print server is ready to use. The one flaw this product has which I didn't expect and people should be aware off is that the print server does not allow two-way communication - this means you will not get ink level warnings and won't get any status notices either. Apart from the lack of two way communication I'd say this is a product worth buying. Currently I wonder as to whether this could be changed via a firmware update - it seems like a minor thing - it just requires the print server to be able to send data and not only receive it - but seeing as it communicates back during setup and can be administered via a website I cannot see that as being a problem. For the eco-minded - it's supposed to consume 3,3V at 2A - i.e. 6,6W max. from the specs on the back of the device.

Once you get it installed, your printer acts jut like a normal printer connected to your computer. I used to have an HP print server, and running it was much more difficult, running the print server software on each computer, and manually connecting to the printer every time. Once you have this thing running and configured, it works very smoothly, and you can easily print from any device. However (and this is a huge however), installing and configuring this device is a nightmare. I am a very technical person, who's been working in the IT industry for more than 20 years, and figuring out how to get this thing running, took a very long time and many attempts, and resetting the device to its factory settings several times, but IT IS POSSIBLE, though not very intuitive, to say the least. Anyone who is not a savvy techie, will not be able to install this device. Installation must be done manually. The automated setup crashes my Windows 10. The problem is, that the setup is trying to meddle with your network settings, in order to connect to the device's default ad-hoc network (however, Windows 10 does not natively connect to ad-hoc networks. You will require a device that can connect. Luckily, I have an iPhone from my workplace, and this is the only time I have ever been happy to carry such a terrible device). Even then, I had many iterations of trial and error, and resetting the print server to its factory settings every time. In the end: success! and it only took me 20 years of hard IT work!

I have had one of these for just over a year now. It wasn't easy to configure - there's a web interface, but using it successfully is quite an intricate process, and it's very easy to get into a situation where you can't connect to it, and have to do a factory reset and start again. There's also a Windows-only configuration tool, which I haven't tried due to not having a Windows machine available to install it on. About six months ago, my device developed a fault whereby it needed to be turned off and on again before it would accept print jobs. This was irritating (if you have to go to the printer and wait 40 seconds for the print server to boot up, you might as well just take your laptop with you and plug it straight into the printer's USB cable), but not fatal. More recently, it has developed a near-total inability to talk to the wifi network. After a day of only being able to connect to it intermittently, I think I'm going to give up and look for a more reliable solution.

I was almost put off buying this because of the reviews which say it is difficult to install, well it isn't...and is well worth the few minutes it took to setup, which was longer than it should be, in my opinion. Let me explain. I first tried the 'Easy Install' (Recommended), which failed to find the printer (an Epson AcuLaser M2000D) so I tried the Setup Wizard (I have no idea what the difference is or why they offer both options) which did find the printer, no problem. There are two things worth further mention, firstly you must install the printer driver before you install the TP-Link software, which in my case meant I had to connect my desktop PC via a USB cable; secondly you have to use the setup disk on any other PC/Laptop that you want to share the printer and here again you have to install the printer drivers and yes that meant connecting the laptop to the printer via a USB cable to complete the installation of the printer driver. But once done it works well and it really is tiny, smaller than a small matchbox, and as I say worth the fiddle.

The process for setting this up if you use a Mac is impossible without a computer science degree. I kid you not the procedure described on the website is as difficult to follow as 1970s machine code. Clearly this product is aimed at the teenage hacker market who love nothing better than to open the bonnet and rummage around in binary porn. For the rest of us this is torture. Basically TP-Link haven’t bothered to write a nice little script to configure this automatically and so it joins the long list of not user friendly crap sold by people with no empathy to the rest of us who haven’t got much time left after juggling time spent between rearing screaming children and working in the hamster wheel. Will give it one more try and if not it’s going back.

I bought this unit along with a TP-Link router after my BT Homehub died and my linksys printserver became very unreliable. The unit works great once set up, it seems to pick up a good signal and is nice and small. The set up is the main issue. Rather than repeat what has been said, I would advise you to read the review by Paul Fisher alongside the official instructions. Be careful on the IP numbers shown as they didn't match the default subnet of the TP-Link router. Lazy of me not to check, but there you go. My biggest concern is that if you don't use the printserver utility to apply a password to the unit, anyone able to access it can see your WEP key as it is not masked. This may be an unlikely occurrence, but it would have been better if the initial set-up utility insisted on a password change. Overall, a good unit which seems to work well (so far).