Brother Printer Troubleshooting

Below are some common troubleshooting steps to fix issues with printing during check-in. If there is trouble with the printer installation or difficulty in finding the printer on your network, the printer manufacturer's support is best to contact for help in those areas.


Brother Printers

Brother Support: 1-877-276-8437

The Brother QL-570 should have similar driver settings as the QL-710W or QL-720NW.


Most-Common Issue Areas

There can be a number of areas needing to be reviewed when troubleshooting. Review each of the following points with your local IT staff to make sure there is not an issue in any of these areas.

Printer Labels:

  1. One of the most common issues is using the wrong labels. You must use the Brother DK-2205 labels. It will say 205 on the side of the label. 
    1. There are continuous feed formats; non-continuous feed labels won't work. 
  2. In addition, you will need the correct spindle. These typically come with labels. The required spindle has two holes on the bottom. 

Pictures below show the correct and incorrect labels and spindles (note the hole-count and "205" or "202" on the side of the labels. 

Correct

Incorrect

Paper Size - Windows Computers:

  1. In this case, the power light on the printer might flash red, and the dimensions that the computer is sending to the printer don't match the labels. 
    1. Go to Control Panel → Devices and Printers → Right-click on the Brother printer → Select Printer Properties.
    2. Click the Preferences button
      1. Paper size: 2.4"
      2. Width: 2.4"
      3. Length: 3.90"
      4. Feed: .12"
      5. Orientation: Landscape
      6. For Brother QL-720NW or QL-820NWB, make sure that Bluetooth is turned OFF
      7. The other options can be left alone
    3. Click Apply, then OK
    4. Next, back in the Printer Properties window, go to the Advanced Tab → Printing Defaults. You may be prompted to enter the local Active Directory username and password to proceed. 
    5. Make the exact same changes here for the corresponding printer as you just did in step II
    6. Click Apply, then OK
  2. To test that it works, attempt to print a test page by going back to Printer Properties → click "Print Test Page"

Paper Size - Mac Computers:

  1. In this case, the power light on the printer might flash red, and the dimensions that the computer is sending to the printer don't match the labels. 
    1. Open TextEdit on the Mac
    2. Go to File → Page Setup
    3. Under Paper Size, select Manage Custom Sizes
    4. Click the + icon to add a new custom size
      1. Width: 2.44"
      2. Length: 3.92"
      3. Optionally rename the custom size to something that is memorable like "Brother Printer"
      4. Click Ok twice and Exit TextEdit
      5. Now, click the Apple Icon in the top-right corner → System Preferences → Printers and Scanners
      6. Select the Brother Printer, then under Default Paper Size select your new custom size. 
      7. You're now ready to print!
  2. To test that it works, attempt to print a test page. 
    1. Click on Apple → System Preferences
    2. Click on Printers and Scanners
    3. Find your machine from the list
    4. Click Open Print Queue
    5. From the Print Queue menu, click Printer → Print Test Page

Driver Issue:

  1. If you followed the steps above but the test page still doesn't print, there could be an issue between the drivers on your computer and the Brother Printer. 
    1. You may need to uninstall/reinstall the Brother drivers.
    2. There is usually a file on Brother's website to help you uninstall the driver. Then, download the driver again. 
    3. We advise contacting Brother Support (contact information is above) to work alongside the church's IT staff to resolve these issues.

Wireless Network Issue:

  1. The most common problem is that the Wireless Network on which the printer is set up has ports 81, 1338, and/or 1339 blocked. Have an IT member or network administrator verify these ports are Open (Both TCP and UDP).
  2. Firewalls may also be blocking at the domain level and need the FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) added. Include the subdomain and the full Your ChMS domain name. For example, if the subdomain is coaching and the full domain is learnchms.com, in the firewall allow for coaching.learnchms.com to be exempt. 

 

Brother Networking Tips

Some must-have considerations and best practice suggestions for network setups when going over wifi or network cable. 

  1. When connecting over wifi, make sure there is a 2.4 GHz network setup for printers. The wireless cards in the printers only support this radio frequency and not the 5 GHz band.
  2. Setup a static IP address on the printers for the best networks connectivity stability. Consult Brother Technical Support or your local IT resources for this implementation. You can change the printer from DHCP to Static in the Printer Setting Tool provided by Brother.
  3. If possible, for the best setup results use a Windows computer. A Mac computer will work, but the results may vary. 

 

Connecting To Your iPad

It could be that your printer isn't available for connection on your iPad. Try following the steps below to resolve that. 

  1. Check to see if the printer is on and connected. 
  2. For QL-820NWB, make sure Bluetooth is off on the iPad. 
  3. If it is On and connected to the same wifi network, download the Brother iPrinter&Scan app to send a test label. If it does not work, chances are that the CUPS is not enabled on your network and you could either set up a wifi hotspot for just the printer and the iPad or get IT help. 
  4. Make sure that the local network button is turned on. 

  1. Check to see if the firewall is blocking. We use port 1339 to listen in from IP 40.121.85.133. Unblocking those in your firewall should at least enable you to print to OneNote, PDF, etc. 
  2. You can change the printers from DHCP to STATIC in the Printer Setting Tool provided by the Brother. Static is the most reliable setting for a network that has multiple devices of the same type on it, but for the best results, it needs to be centrally managed on their DHCP server with address reservations. If you only set up the address on the printer, there is nothing stopping the DHCP server from giving that address out to something else and causing the printer to become unavailable. 

Converting the QL-820NWB From Wifi to LAN (Cable) Connection

Before starting, plug in the network cable to the printer. You cannot have the wireless-enabled for the LAN (Wired) connection to work. 

  1. Through the printer menu, find the Administration (4/7) → Reset → Factory Reset
  2. After the printer restarts, configure the correct Date and Time with the arrow keys. 
  3. Power off the device and restart it. 
  4. Download the basic Brother Printer Driver software to a PC/Mac computer: Download Here!

  1. Connect a printer USB cable from your computer to the printer with the printer powered ON.
  2. Run the driver setup wizard (bsq16aw160aus.exe - the file name may be different based on release time and operating system) and in the setup wizard, configure the printer to use a wired connection. Apply the defaults for the setup options. Using the other custom configuration options can pose challenges once the setup is complete.
  3. Let the wizard run through the setup and complete the configuration. 
  4. Remove the USB cable from the printer and power cycle the printer.

Test the printer to make sure it is recognized on your network for printing with an iPad or computer on the same network. 

 

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