Ethernet printer names (TM-T82II)

[influencersaus1]

Hi there,

We recently setup a new PoS system with 4 printers and 3 Square terminals (iOS) on the same network. All the printers, which are Epson TM-T82II's were setup with static IP's and specific location/dns/bonjour names in their web config and do appear and work with square.

The problem I'm having seems to be in the printer naming in the Square settings. I can change the name of printer stations just fine, but when I go to browse the list of available printers, the printers appear with:

Wi-Fi Printer 1
Wi-Fi Printer 2
Wi-Fi Printer 3
Wi-Fi Printer 4

None of these printers are Wi-Fi, being all ethernet connected.. but the main problem is that when power is lost to one of these printers, all the numbers switch up.. meaning that Printer 1, which might have been in the Kitchen, attached to the Kitchen Printer Station.. suddenly has switched with the Cafe PoS receipt printer.. so now order tickets are coming out the Cafe PoS printer and not the Kitchen printer. Things get even more messier when multiple printers have been switched off.

This means I need to re-setup all the printer stations every morning, which is annoying because I have to work out which number corresponds with which printer. I've searched pretty deep into the web-configs for the printers and there seems to be no setting calling these printers "Wi-Fi Printer X", so I'm assuming its something occuring in Square.

So my questions is, how do I go about handling a situation like this? Can I rename these printers (the actual printers, not the station) to something more useful so that they don't constantly switch with each other?

Any help would be much appreciated.

[Seamus]

Hey @influencersaus1,

Thanks for reaching out.

If you go to a web browser on a device that's connected to the same WiFi network, you should be able to type in the printer's IP address and give it a custom name.

You can find the printer's IP by turning it off, holding down the feed button and turning it back on again. This will give you a print out that should contain the printer's IP.

Hope this helps - it's not something I've tried personally, so let me know how you go 👍

[influencersaus2]

Hi @Seamus,

Thanks for the response, however as I mentioned in the first paragraph of my post:

”All the printers, which are Epson TM-T82II's were setup with static IP's and specific location/dns/bonjour names in their web config and do appear and work with square.“

I have already tried this and the names entered in on any of the web config do not correlate with what is listed in square.

i have tried local name, administrator name, DNS name, bonjour name and pretty much every other field on the Printer config relating to naming.

[Seamus]

Hey @influencersaus2,

Looks like I misread part of your initial post - if you've already tried this unfortunately I don't have any further troubleshooting steps at hand, though I've raised this with our Product Manager to see if he's able to offer any further advice.

If we don't have a solution here, I guess the next step would be looking at what's causing the printers to lose power on a frequent basis - do you have a set-up where you're frequently unplugging or moving the printers around?

[influencersaus2]

@Seamus

They loose power since they get switched off at the close of each business day for power saving purposes.

The odd thing for me is that they’re listing at “Wi-Fi Printer X” in square when these aren’t Wi-Fi printers, nor is there any reference to the words “Wi-Fi Printer” in the Epson config. Which leads me to believe something in the square software might be causing it.

[Seamus]

Hey @influencersaus2,

An Ethernet / WiFi printer are one in the same - the printer plugs into your router with an Ethernet cable, but it connects to Square via sharing the same WiFi network - ie it's not plugged into your iPad via Ethernet, it's connecting via WiFi.

I'm not sure how much electricity a printer turned on overnight would actually consume, but I can definitely appreciate wanting to conserve power.

Perhaps you could experiment with turning the printers off and on in a certain order, for example turn printer 4 off first, then 3, 2 and 1 in that order. Then when you turn on Printer 1 first in the morning, then 2, 3 and 4. I know it's not the solution you were looking for, but it may be preferable than having to set up new printer stations each time if there's no other solution.