Install & Configure Print Services in Windows Server 2016

Install Print Services Role in Windows Server

First of all, we need to install Print and document services role on Windows server 2016. Consequently you can use Windows server print services.

Role Installation

1. Open Server Manger and click on Add roles and features to install Print and document services role.

2. In the Welcome we’ve got nothing to do at all. Click on Next button. In Select destination serverpage, elect the Select a server from the server pool. Select the server you want to install the role on from the list below. Click on Next button.

3. Put a check mark in the box next to Print and document services. A small windows pops up and wants you to add some features for print services management. Click on Add features to install management tools. If you don’t install the management features, you just install the core service.

4. In the Print and Document Services page, provided essential information about the services to be noted. Finally click on Next button.

5. In the Select role services page four options are visible:

 1. Print Server: It is the actual print server. Selecting this option you can manage print services components as printers and drivers and furthermore things.

2. Distributed Scan Server: allows you to send scanned images to specific users or     groups in the domain.

3. Internet Printing: It creates a web page and gives the access to printer clients using printers through IIS web server.

4. LPD Service: This option enables UNIX clients running line printer remote (LPR) to send print    jobs to Windows printers. I install only Print Server.

6. We’re almost done. Click on Install button for installing the role on server. No reboot is needed.

Configure Print Services in Windows Server

First of all we need to add some printers and drivers on the server and manage them.

Open Server Manager, click on Tools dropdown menu and select Print Management services. Using this tool we can add and manage print services easily.

While Print Management tool is opened. Expand Custom Filters on the left pane to see the custom filters. You see four default filters:

1. All Printers: It shows the list of all printer connected to the domain from all print servers.
2. All Drivers: You can see a complete list of all drivers available for your clients through all the domain.
3. Printers Not Ready: It shows you list the servers which are not available to clients. They don’t work, fix them.
4. Printers With Jobs: Shows the list of printers currently doing print jobs.

Below Custom Filters another option is visible by the name Print Servers. Expand it to see all the print server in your domain. You can add all print servers in the domain here for easy management. Just right-click on Print Servers and select Add Server and go on.

You can see the same options like drivers and printer below the SVR-A server as the below Custom Filters. So the difference between this and the Custom Filter is that which the printers shown below the filter is the list of all printers in the domain. The printers below the Print Servers is the list of printers installed on each print server.

Add Printer

1. Print Management tool opened, expand Print Servers and right-click on the server and select Add Printer option.

2. In the Welcome page we’ve nothing to do so just click on Next button. In the Printer Installationpage select the Add a new printer using an existing port. Elect a port and hit Next button.

3. In the Printer Driver page select Use an existing printer driver on the computer option. From the drop-down list select a driver that matches your printer device manufacturer and model.

4. Now you need to type a name for the printer in the box shown in the picture below. Below the Printer Name you can also see another option: Share this printer. As a result you can choose a share name and location for the printer. If needed you can leave a comment for users guidance.

5. Finally we are done with adding printer on a server. Just click on Finish button to finish the wizard. While finished the wizard you can find the printer in All Printers option in the left pane. If you would like to print a test page selecting Print a test page at the bottom of the wizard also you can add another printer by selecting Add another printer.

Add Driver

Maybe you need different kinds of drivers for client computers to use be able to use print device. So you need to have 32-bit and 64-bit drivers.

1. First of all you need to right-click on Drivers option below the server which you want to add driver to. Select the Add driver option.

2. In the Welcome page we have nothing to do. In the Processor Selection page you need to specify which kind of processors do your clients use. You can one or both of the options and hit Next.

3. In the Printer Driver Selection page you need to specify two things. First of all you should specify your devices’s manufacturer. Secondly specify the printer model. In addition to these you have one more useful option. If you have driver on a disk, you can click on Have Disk button and find path of the source and add it.

4. We are done and the driver was added to the server. So click on Finish button due to finish the wizard.

Finish the Wizard