Windows – Cannot connect to a shared printer on local network; error 0x00004005

Like Gregory MOUSSAT says...

And I've been an MCSE since 1997 for a LARGE corporation (8,000 users). The "on [server name]" is hard coded into the Windows Operating system to identify that the printer is NOT local. Printers without this suffix MUST BE LOCAL (not network) printers.

SOLUTION: The only way to "get around" this is to create a LOCAL printer, and connect to the printer DIRECTLY OVER ETHERNET, instead of through a server's print queue.

Yes, this means that each workstation will talk directly to the printer, and manage it's own queue... it works fine, unless someone sends a huge job to the printer - you can't see it to kill it, 'cause it's on their LOCAL printer queue, instead of the server queue.

I've done this a few times (while KEEPING the server print queue available for everyone else), for some very "special" user cases. But frankly, you could do it for everyone... until you need to figure out who's sending the 500 page junk jobs to the printer!

I had the same problem with a Datamax-O'Neil label printer that's connected via Ethernet and hosted off a Windows Storage Server 2008 R2 (print server), and I resolved the issue using the following steps:

• On the print server I selected Properties for the printer (queue) in question.
• Select the Tools tab.
• There is a Driver Options... button I selected.
• In the Driver Options window I selected the Network Settings tab.
• I then checked off box Bidirectional Communication under the Network Features section and this did the trick.

I no longer get the dialog box with the error message when I connect to the printer from a Client PC. Hopefully this helps anyone else having the same problem.