Hi,
We have a windows domain (with 2008 domain controllers, and one 2003 domain controller), and several hundred clients. The clients are all running Vista or 7, with the exception of perhaps a dozen XP computers.
There is also a RDP/terminal server (running 2008 R2) that about 60 users connect to.
We're getting rid of all our old printers, and signing a lease to get new, networked devices. Would like an easy, straightforward way to map printers to the users, regardless whether they're logging onto their local machine or onto the RDP server. Whichever they log on to, they would need the same printers mapped. Each user is going to need one printer (for the most part - depending on what department or building they're in), and perhaps 2 or 3 more just as backups.
We have our printers named pretty consistently, such as:
Accounting-prn1
Accounting-prn2
etc.
I would love to be able to, for instance, create security groups, one for each printer, and then based on what group(s) the user is in, those are the printers that it maps to him. Thus if a user ever switches locations or departments, we just put them in that new printer group, and they're good to go when they log in next.
My question is what is the best way to do this? Also, how would I handle which printer is their 'default'? I.E. if they're in three printer groups, and i want one to be the default, is there a particular way to do it? If not, as long as it maps all three of them, and they can go in and manually pick which one they want as their default (but the one they pick should stay their defalut, so the next time they log in, it doesn't 'reset' it)
Just overall looking for the best way at the end of the day to manage several hundre users printing to ~75 networked printers
Please dont' just post links for me to read - i want to have some actual opinions :)