OK, you non-Mac users, move along. Nothing to see here. You remaining ten folks, limber up your noggins, ‘cuz I’m asking for some help.

Without going into brain-stunning detail, I have a small home network. On my primary server unit, an inkjet printer, the HP 970Cxi, is configured to be available to the network via OS X’s USB printer sharing. It works well for all machines.

However, the HP offers a cool feature that I use when printing locally by default, two-sided printing. On only one of the networked machines does this option appear when printing to the remote queue.

On my main desktop machine, the option is not available in the remote dialogs, but if I plug the printer directly into that machine, the option becomes available.

My main machine is using 10.3.x, the server is under 10.2.x (8, I think), and the other machines that use the service are also under 10.2.x.

I’m digging around at Apple, and my instinct tells me that for some reason, the desktop machine is using two different printer drivers when it should be using the same one for both instances.

Any experience, insight, or opinions out there?

UPDATE: Goodness! MacSurfer linked to this in their headlines. So… Let me add some info resources.

I did find a thread on the Apple Discussions website, not about the disappearing two-sided printer option under USB printer sharing specifically, but about the disappearing option under HP printer drivers. I was unable to use the thread to develop a resolution, however.

Regrettably, Apple deletes old discussion threads after an unreasonably short period – three months – so the utility of the link and the data there is quite llimited.

The gist of the thread is to install the updated HP drivers, and to always work through the ‘Page Format…” dialog when printing. However, not everyone finds that the update respects the two-sided option.

I did install the updated driver, and it did not provide the two-sided option when revising the settings for the remote printer.

UPDATE II: A comment from Manuel led to some thinking, and a patient readthrough of the HP driver readme led to the resolution. HP mentions that version differences between drivers could cause unexpected printer results. So I gingerly installed the updated drivers on the server, and voila, I have access to the 2-sided printing and ink-throttling features again. Thanks, Manny, and thanks Internet!