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I recently lost connection to my ePrinter. Based on my wireless network tests, I am told MAC address filtering may be enabled on my wireless router (Airport extreme) and I need to add the MAC address of my printer to the list of permitted devices for my wireless router. I tried this, several times, and it still does not work. Any suggestions what I can try next?
Unless you specifically went into the settings of the AirPort Extreme and for some reason changed them to not allow your printer to connect to the network, MAC Address Filtering would have nothing to do with the issue that you are experiencing.
Truth be known, "check your MAC Address Filtering" is what support people say when they have no idea what the real issue might be. But, it does sound impressive and more importantly.....it gets the user off of the phone or out of the online discussion.
It would help us if we could get the make and model number of your printer and tell us what you have already tried as far as troubleshooting. We do not need the serial number, so please do not post that information.
Unless you have made some manual changes on your AirPort Extreme, the AirPort is not the issue here, but we'll try to help. If all else fails, you will need to reset the printer back to its original factory default settings and then set it up again, so you might want to have the setup guide for the printer handy to know how to do this.
Unless you specifically went into the settings of the AirPort Extreme and for some reason changed them to not allow your printer to connect to the network, MAC Address Filtering would have nothing to do with the issue that you are experiencing.
Truth be known, "check your MAC Address Filtering" is what support people say when they have no idea what the real issue might be. But, it does sound impressive and more importantly.....it gets the user off of the phone or out of the online discussion.
It would help us if we could get the make and model number of your printer and tell us what you have already tried as far as troubleshooting. We do not need the serial number, so please do not post that information.
Unless you have made some manual changes on your AirPort Extreme, the AirPort is not the issue here, but we'll try to help. If all else fails, you will need to reset the printer back to its original factory default settings and then set it up again, so you might want to have the setup guide for the printer handy to know how to do this.
By default, MAC address filtering is not enabled on the AirPort base stations. Apple calls this feature: Timed Access. So, in theory, any wireless client will have access to the base stations wireless network. Only if you add their wireless MAC address, and set time limits, can you control when they do not have access. Is this what you want? It doesn't sound like it from your post. The other thing to keep in mind that some network clients could have multiple MAC addresses. For example, one for Wi-Fi and one for their Ethernet connection. This may be true for your printer as well.
I have not enabled this Timed Access control at all and hence I can’t figure out why my printer network test is telling me this is the problem.
It used to work in the past. The 3 things that have changed recently are 1. I reset my Airport router due to network outage issues and 2. I upgraded to OS Catalina.
I tried enabling the Timed Access control and added my printer MAC address. That did not work as well.
I’m really stumped!
The 3 things that have changed recently are 1. I reset my Airport router due to network outage issues and 2. I upgraded to OS Catalina.
I tried enabling the Timed Access control and added my printer MAC address. That did not work as well.
If you reset the AirPort router, then in effect you have a "new" router that the printer may or may not recognize.....even if you used the exact same names, security and password for the AirPort. That is why you would need to reset the printer back to its factory defaults and then set it up again.
"Updating" to Catalina could also possibly cause an issue with the printer if HP has released updates for newer operating systems. Check to make sure that you have the latest printer drivers from HP.
Please do not try to "enable" the printer using Timed Access, this only make things more complicated. Later, once you have the printer working again you could set up a "rule" in Timed Access to only allow users to print during given hours each day, but most users don't want to fool with something like this.
Timed Access is really designed to keep Junior's iPad off of the Internet in the middle of the night.
For now, please delete any settings that you might have set up for the printer in Timed Access.
There is an old saying among network guys..........Change one thing on the network and everything on the network will change.
I reset the printer to factory settings and joined the network from scratch. I had to learn how to add WPS printer on the Airport Extreme (thanks to google) and it finally worked !
Thanks everyone who contributed to solving my problem. Much appreciated.
You’re right... I did not change any settings in my Airport Express.
my printer model is HP Officejet 4620.
I will try to reset to factory settings and start from scratch.
Did you load the HP drivers for that? HP has an updated set from November 2020.
MAC Address Filtering
