Using the Davinci through USB over Ethernet

Hi All,

I am hoping someone else has addressed the idea of connecting to their printer through a remote USB port connected to their LAN. By this I do not mean the idea of using Ethernet cables to give a long USB wire but the idea of plugging a device which has a USB port on it into the Router (or other Ethernet device)  and then using driver software to "fool" the application software into thinking it is really talking to a local USB port. If not here is my progress so far.

I should say I was running Win 8.1 but have succumbed to Win10 recently. I won't comment on that, there is enough about already.

So at this stage I was running Win 8.1. As noted I am wanting to communicate with my stock DaVinci over my LAN rather than use the USB port directly. To this end I purchased a TP-Link TL-PS310U (V2) unit which is described as an MFP and storage server. In this way a device (intended to be a paper printer or MFP device (eg scanner/copier/printer) can be connected to the LAN and shared. It can also handle USB memory devices which are also then shareable (one user at a time).

The details of the TL-PS310U can be seen at:http://www.tp-link.com.au/products/details/cat-4759_TL-PS310U.html#specifications

It is a tiny device fitting in the palm of your hand.

Immediately following purchase I connected the TL-PS310U to the same TP-Link Ethernet switch my PC connects to, loaded up the driver and utility software, rebooted and plugged in a USB key. Instantly (well as instantly as you get with Windows) the TL-PS310U and the attached USB key were available and I could read and write to the key at leisure. You bewdy I thought, just like a bought one, as we say here.

So the next thing was the Davinci. So I connected the TL-PS310U to the TP-Link Ethernet  (in another room) which serves the other computers in my house. And sure enough I could see the  TL-PS310U and the Davinci (It reported as a webcam but hey I am not fussy). I immediately connected to it and ran up XYZWare and sure enough I could see the bed and extruder temperature. So then I sent a print. It got 2/3 the way through and the TL-PS310U crashed and disappeared from the system and took the Davinci with it. And that problem was repeated and repeatable. Smaller prints would sometimes work but the TL-PS310U would always disappear during the print itself.

Now that leaves me in a place I always hate. No-mans land. I can't go to TP-Link as they will say this is an unsupported printer and I can't really say I expected it to be supported. I can't go to XYZ as it is a third party product. The problem is solidly mine.

So when in doubt Google about. I also found that I could induce the same sort of crash if I intensely transferred large files to and  from a USB key, my earlier test being somewhat superficial. Latest drivers?? - done. No improvement. The TP-Link site indicates that the TL-PS310U is fussy about the network adapter driver in the host computer. So I tracked that down and yes the problem seemed to be solved. I could send long prints, leave the printer on for hours monitoring progress/temperature and it did not fail. I will not say it would not fail - it may be I just didn't see it.

Then I changed to Win10 and the the problem was back at a measurable rate. (Someone notable in the PC industry years ago said it like this: "If you can measure the error rate, it is too high"). I am not going back to Win 8 - I have just gotten used to and tamed Win 10. OK I thought - same problem, same solution. Track down the latest drivers, including the network adapter driver for Win 10. Done and the problem is better but not cured.

I can send a long print provided I plug a USB hub into the TL-PS310U and the Davinci into the hub. Say what?? That is ridiculous, it should not matter. But even with the hub it won't last an entire print. Without the hub  I am back to the crash 1/2 to 2/3 the way through a print transmission. Why did I try a hub?? I wanted to see if other devices vanished with the Davinci during a crash and yes they do. The whole TL-PS310U becomes invisible to the host computer while the lights on it continue to appear to be correctly active. The host computer is unaffected it seems.

It appears that the only device the TL-PS310U won't support is the Davinci unless it is related to the fact that I am connecting to a different Ethernet switch between tests. I cannot see the problem with that except a minor increase in latency.

Incidentally I have two TL-PS310U and they both behave the same. It is not as if the TL-PS310U won't do things not in the spec either. Right now I have an Arduino Pro Mini connected through a Silicon Labs USB to UART bridge taking console traffic through a TL-PS310U connected to my local Ethernet switch and it has run for days like this, wrinkle free.

So if anyone has ideas I am all ears. Either in using another USB print server which is known to work or what to do with the TL-PS310U so that it becomes solid.

Hopefully someone else has done this. If not I hope that this is useful.

Regards, Fred.