Irvine, Calif.-based Lantronix Inc. announced worldwide availability of its new xPrintServer – Cloud Print Edition mobile printing device on Wednesday.
The small hardware box connects to printers in your office or home that don’t support cloud print technology for Android smartphones or tablets, and devices running Google’s Chrome Browser or ChromeOS. Those printers get a wireless boost and are enabled to accept print requests from users of those Google-infused devices. It’s the first print server to be certified by Google to support its cloud print technology.
Lantronix describes its device as about the size of smartphone. There’s no need to install any drivers or software to make it work with your printer, and its made to automatically discover printers and configure them for use. It’s a plug and play setup, just connect xPrinterServer to the network and go.
The device also supports Google Apps, so businesses relying on the cloud-based productivity suite and print documents from their browsers. One perk of Google’s cloud print service is once you’ve authenticated a user with a printer, they can print to it from anywhere over the Internet – so you don’t even have to be in the office to queue up a print job.
A growing number of new printers are supporting printing from mobile devices, increasingly a popular option as professionals spend more time on their smartphones and complete work tasks with them. Efforts like those of the Mopria Alliance mean the printer industry is moving towards a standard of being compatible for printing from a wider range of mobile devices, and in an integrated way that doesn’t require any special apps. But for offices using older printer that still work fine except for working with mobile devices, a piece of hardware such as the one offered by Latronix can be a good solution.
The Google-friendly xPrintServer – Cloud Print Edition is available in Canada now and retails for US$149.95. If you’re more of an Apple Inc. fan and want to print from iOS devices, you’ll want to buy either the XPrint-Server Home Edition for US$99.95 or the Office Edition for $199.95.
Lantronix made this ad about a surly IT worker to illustrate just how easy its server is to set up:
