Printer sharing of Brother HL-2140 does not work on Big Sur

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Level 1

35 points

Printer sharing of Brother HL-2140 does not work on Big Sur

Printer sharing of my Brother HL-2140 stopped working when I upgraded Big Sur to 11.6.7. I have set Printer Sharing set ON for the 2018 MacMini running BigSur 11.6.7 to which the printer is attached, on my 2017 MacBookAir running Big Sur 11.6.7 (which is not attached to a printer), and to my wife's 2009 MacBook Pro running El Capitan 10.11.6. Both of them were able to print using the shared Brother printer before I installed 11.6.7; neither of them do now. I can print from the MacMini to which the printer is attached, but not from either of the two other computers on my wireless network. Any ideas what might work?

Mac mini, macOS 11.6

Posted on Jul 3, 2022 11:29 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Jan Hedlund

Level 7

23,401 points

Jul 3, 2022 3:21 PM in response to fiberhome

Hi,

Any change if you try the following procedure?

Power off the Wi-Fi router, the USB printer and the Mac mini, the MacBook Air, the MacBook Pro, and all other computers and devices. Wait two to three minutes. Power on the router. Wait two to three minutes. Power on the printer and then the Mac mini. Wait a minute or two. Power on the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro. Finally, power on all other computers/devices.

Share your printer on Mac – Apple Support (UK)

Are you using the macOS 10.15 Catalina printer software for the macOS 11.6.7 Mac mini? Big Sur is not supported for the HL-2140, but the Catalina driver has been reported to work with some models anyway.

https://support.brother.com/g/b/downloadlist.aspx?c=us_ot&lang=en&prod=hl2140_all&os=10060

Reset the Mac printing system to solve a problem – Apple Support (UK)

Add a printer on Mac – Apple Support (UK)

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Answer 2

fiberhome Author

Level 1

35 points

Jul 4, 2022 3:15 PM in response to Jan Hedlund

Thanks. This almost worked, but you did not spell out the vital final step. For each machine I had to open a new printer file for the HL-2140 in the Printers & Scanners System Preference, starting with the MacMini where the HL-2140 is plugged into a USB port, than go to the two other machines, open the Printers & Scanners System preference, hit + to add a printer, identify the HL 2140 on the MacMini and then add it. Once the new Printer is set up, you can print on it. It is best to delete the old HL-2140 printer file (making sure to not delete the new one), so you don't accidentally start trying to send files to a nonexistent printer file.

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Answer 3

Jan Hedlund

Level 7

23,401 points

Jul 5, 2022 2:37 AM in response to fiberhome

Thank you for the report.

Sharing a USB printer like this is not always without complication.

If the printer is located not too far from the an existing Wi-Fi router, you may want to carry out experiments with an HL-2140 connection via a USB-to-Ethernet print server instead. TP-Link TL-PS110U is just one example (an online auction site should have several other models as well). The print server could then be wired (Ethernet) to one of the LAN ports of the router. That should allow independent wireless printing from each computer. Access to appropriate printer drivers for all three computers required, though.

Anyway, good to hear that it is possible to print now.

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