need to deploy network printer to winxp and win7 clients - using GP Preferences

Set these three settings:
Computer Config\Policies\Admin Templates\Printers\
Only use package point and printer: disabled
Package Point and Print Approved Servers: enabled (enter FQDN of printer server)
Point and Print Restrictions: enabled (enter FQDN of priner server
When installing drivers for a new connection: Do not show warning or elevation prompt When updating drivers for an existing connection: Do not show warning or elevation prompt
 

You would have to have two sets of policies, as Win 7 has several local machine and user policies that do not port over from the XP side. I have the same situation here. Windows 7 print manager manages the printers and drivers. So I download the Win 7 drivers for those few machines. In most cases, I use the HP Universal Print driver. Is your server Win 2008? In which case you can use the same Print manager to deploy drivers to your Win 7 machines.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd878494%28WS.10%29.aspx

jmoody10 - I'm deploying these printers to a user ou - in other words the GP is scoped to users.  I'm configuring these preferences on the user configuartion side.  Your recommendations are on the computer config side.

Wolfhere - no the print server is windows 2003.  And the drivers for these two printer are winxp 32bit.  Are you saying I should go to the advanced tab and change the driver to the hp universal print driver.  Will that work for the xp clients and win7 clients.  
Thanks guys.

Configre them on the computer side and enable loopback policy processing (in merge mode)
Link it to your users OU. In the scope, you can leave authenicated users.

So you're saying the only change I have to make is to configure the printers in preferences on the computer sie.  I don't have to change my printer drivers at all on the print server.  I'm using a security group to filter the policy for the users I want to receive these printers - just a shadow group of an OU - can I maintain that.
So there's no way to just use the universal printer driver for this kind of situation.

It depends on the printer. I just got through migrating about 1,500 desktops/laptops to 7. I had that exact same event error. You will want to add additional drivers for 7 to your print server.
I found that most printers could use a 7 driver and still print fine to XP (as opposed to the other way around).
One more tip: set your printer drivers to isolation mode on your 7 clients (in case you get a bad driver).

Ok - I'm going to use the universal print driver on one of these printers and see what happens.  Be back shortly.

Ok. You probably won't here back from me until 7:00 AM EST.

*hear back from me.

didn't work.  using the hp universal printer driver had no effect on the win7 clients and it screwed up the xp clients which there are a lot more of so I changed the driver back.  I also checked hp and for the hp laserjet 4250 and the hp laserjet 1200 series - looks like they don't have win7 printer drivers for these two printers.    With no win7 printer drivers - not really sure how to handle this.  Really frustrating - everytime there's a change and something is supposed to be easier - you have another headache.
I guess my question now is without win7 printer drivers - am I basically dead in the water in terms of getting these printers to show up on the win7 clients using GP Preferences.  
My goal is to have these printers follow this user group.  Most of my clients are xp but I do have some win7.  Anyway, I'll check in later.  Frustrated.

I have a ton of 4250s. I used the HP Universal Printing PCL 6 driver (v5.0) for windows 7/xp

jmoody10 - ok so let me get clear on this.
i want to deploy a 4250 shared on a win2003 print server.  i want to deploy this printer to the secuirty group i have created for the users that need this printer.  i did change the driver for this printer to the exact one you mentioned.  No change.  Printer did not show up on win7 machines and I received the same error in the app log.  However, I did not implement your above recommendations in your initial post.  For this to work, do i have to change the printer driver and implement your recommendations in your initial post for this printer to show up on win7 machines.
also what about my security group.  I'm assuming i can still scope this to the secuirty group or does it work better if i just go with the default scoping and authenticated users.
And don't forget I'm using preferences.  Are you using login scripts or preferences.  Anyway, thanks for your help.

I am using preferences. In your printer policy, set the scope to authenicated users. On the specific printer preference, use Item Level Targetting to narrow it down to a specific security group.
You will need to set the three settings above as well as use that windows 7 driver.

jmoody -  did you use the attached driver:
You know it's frustrating because I only have like two win7 clients but you know this is something that has to get worked out because we'll only be addming more win7 clients.   I just don't want to jack up my xp clients.  Anyway, just curious - did you ever find out why we have to go through those steps in your above post to get this to work.  Why is that.
As an aside, how have you done with deploying printers to computers with GP Preferences.  That has not been fun either.
Anyway, I will try what you recommended and post back as soon as I can.  Made take a day or two because they have me running all over so please stay tuned.  Thanks.
upd-5-1-1-8232-pcl6-win-xp-vista.exe

Thanks for all your help.  Sorry for the delay in closing this question.  Your time and input is greatly appreciated.

No problem at all!