I’ve recently brought a new laptop and made the terrible mistake of buying it with Microsoft Windows Vista on it. I’ve had no end of grief from Vista, the latest problem being accessing my printer which is a shared printer on a Windows XP Home box. Every time I tried to connect it gave me the message Windows Cannot Connect To The Printer. Access Is Denied which is annoying as I need access to my printer.

Searching around the Internet I found it’s a very very common problem and Microsoft, sadly, don’t seem to have published a fix anywhere not to be beaten however I’ve found a solution that works for me.

1. Install the printer driver locally on the Vista PC as if the printer is connected to the Vista PC.
2. Right click on the printer icon and select “Properties” then go to “Ports”.
3. Select “Add Port” and select “Local Port” and “New Port” then enter the string “\\computername\printername” replacing each with the relevant name.

The experience I’ve had with Microsoft Windows Vista is enough to put me off Microsoft software for life, there’s never been a better opportunity for another business to step in and grab market share from Microsoft since the release of Windows 3.11.

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