i have this old printer, samsung ml2165w, it is a simple laser printer that prints fast, prints with very decent quality and the toner for it is cheap
the printer has very few buttons, one to turn on/off the printer, another to set wps settings and thats it
the other day i was going to print on it, and pc couldnt find it, the page didnt came out
i tried to check if driver had problems, perhaps i chose wrong printer(pdf printer perhaps), then i checked if the problem was because i connected pc via wifi(i ran out of ethernet ports on my router) perhaps it was because printer was in wifi 2.4 ghz and pc was on 5 ghz(printer doesnt have ethernet connector, just wifi 2.4ghz)
i tried to print from my smartphone that has it installed but it couldnt see printer either
for some reason i was sure it had to be related to some weird ip setting on the router splitting ips from 5ghz and 2.4ghz or something like that, so i went to the router config page but couldnt find anything related to that
when using the connected devices tab in the router, i found a device with a weird ip, it was my printer
having the ip it was using, i went to the web browser and entered that ip, gave user and password to the printer, and then set again the right static ip for the printer, it immediately gave me that page i sent like a hour before
while trying to fix the problem, mentally i blamed fedora, i blamed router, i blamed samsung driver, i blamed printer, i blamed isp, i blamed every single thing i could imagine but it was me, that when pressing that wps button, perhaps by accident, changed the ip of the printer to a new static address because that is a function that wps button has, somehow
the problem with these dumb/smart printers is the lack of access to a config menu outside a ip on a web browser, because this printer has no screen or buttons to set anything
the buttons it has, power and wps offer other functions like printer status report, toner report, the wps stuff and other functions, each function requires a different time to press the button
a manual i found online mentions like 8 functions from just the wps button, power offers 2, power it on and off and wake up printer from sleep when is turned on in case pc cant wake it up
the point of all this is, keep the manual at hand and be patient, because after like 12+ years you will not remember what a button does on a printer you rarely use and problems generated are most likely your fault, for not buying a printer with a screen and buttons