Your enterprise faces a lot of challenges, but some of the most difficult ones come from right inside your business IT itself. As your business grows, the tools of the trade that once served you well can start to slow you down.
The biggest culprit? Print servers.
Below we’ll look at common print server issues and show you how serverless print management can take the hassle out of your enterprise printing.
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When we’re done, we think you’ll agree that it’s time to stop wasting your organization’s resources and relegate print servers to the pile of legacy technology where they belong.
Print Servers are Complex and Pricey
First of all, print servers are difficult for IT admins to manage and maintain. They’re not exactly super-intuitive for end-users, either. And now that better alternatives exist, their costs outweigh whatever benefits they bring to your business.
Costs of Print Servers
For something that promises to streamline printing, print servers certainly can add a heavy financial burden to an enterprise.
The total cost of ownership (TCO) for print servers is more than just their initial price tag. Print servers come with several associated costs, including:
- Licensing
- Cooling
- Power
- Physical security
- Digital security
- Management
- Upgrades and maintenance
All of these costs add up over time. That’s why the average print server can cost an enterprise anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000 USD per year to maintain. What if you could invest those funds into other business resources? Just think how your enterprise could grow as a result.
Single Point of Failure Risks
In addition to the high costs of print servers, these servers also come with risks and difficulties that aren’t present with serverless print management. For instance, there are the risks that come from a single point of failure. With a centralized system, if the server crashes, then nobody can print anything.
With a decentralized system, one point of failure isn’t quite as devastating to the enterprise. However, one failure can still slow down the entire operation, even if it doesn’t bring the business to a halt.
Furthermore, a decentralized system requires more infrastructure and oversight. That just multiplies your overall costs.
Scripting and GPO Management Overhead
Next, consider the overhead that comes from scripting and GPO management. Scripts and GPOs are painstaking to configure and call for a lot of intervention from IT. That can take up a lot of their time and resources—even for basic tasks like getting a new user set up with a printer. Your IT staff could be using their time in more productive ways.
With serverless print management solutions, you can deploy printers to your end-users without the need for scripting, GPOs, or admin rights. You and your IT team can both save time and energy, putting your resources to better use. Meanwhile, you also get faster user logins, default printer options, and advanced printer deployment.
Help Desk Requests
Most printer-related service requests aren’t complaints about a single unavailable printer. They actually have to do with employees not being able to install the printers in the first place.
Traditional print management solutions certainly don’t make this easy. Even tech-savvy computer users regularly run into trouble with printer installation, which only gets worse if you have remote offices.
When users run into trouble, they understandably call the IT helpdesk.
Now everything’s in a holding pattern. End-users must contact support, and IT is forced to step away from important tasks to deal with routine printer issues.
Once again, a different allocation of resources could result in better productivity, but with print servers, many organizations don’t have that choice. To make matters worse, those calls to the service desk can get expensive.
Serverless print management, however, eliminates those problems and can help your enterprise make better use of its time and money.
Management Headaches
Of course, we can’t overlook all the management troubles that come from print servers. It’s not just deploying printers or changing settings. Print servers also force IT to deal with day-to-day struggles like software patches, server migrations, and security checks.
All of those tasks add up and take their toll on your energy. For example, you might deal with all of the following issues:
- Driver management. Updating drivers has always been a headache. Historically, driver updates have been one of the most problematic aspects of keeping an enterprise print environment running smoothly. Common printer driver management problems include improper 32- and 64-bit deployment, incorrect configuration, and incompatibility with the workstation OS or endpoint device.
- Complicated caveats. With print servers, complex situations require even more complex workarounds. You and your IT team may need to get creative, and the more printing sites you have, the more complicated your solutions will have to be.
- Driver conflicts. Sometimes drivers get along just fine. At other times, they’re like two children in the backseat of a car during a long road trip. Is your IT team spending way too much time on managing driver conflicts just to keep the whole system from crashing?
The Solution? Serverless Printing
Serverless printing is pretty much just what it sounds like—that is, the ability for large groups of end-users to print to shared printers without the need for a dedicated print server.
With serverless printing, end-users send their documents to network printers directly. There’s no need to route anything through a single node. As a result, you can get rid of all the headaches, inefficiencies, and extra costs we’ve highlighted above.
Serverless printing solutions can take different forms. They can be an on-prem solution, such as a virtual appliance. Or they can be a cloud-based SaaS solution. Either way, when done right, serverless enterprise printing brings all the following features and benefits:
- Keeping print jobs local
- Supporting native print drivers
- Integrating with printer control panels
- Eliminating the need for VPN connections
- Supporting VDI users
What Does Serverless Printing Look Like?
In short, less equals more. Enterprises derive a ton of printing advantages—more uptime, more flexibility, more features, more cost savings—from almost zero print infrastructure.
Serverless Printing With Printerlogic
Once you eliminate the burdens of print servers, you’ll notice several benefits almost immediately:
- Simplified print infrastructure
- Streamlined print management
- Empowered end-users and helpdesk staff
- Reduced calls to the helpdesk
- Added ROI
Why not give it a try for yourself? Arranging a free, no-strings demo is quick and easy.
Need more info before you’re ready to dive into a proof of concept? That’s totally fine, too. Contact us today with any questions you might have about PrinterLogic or serverless printing in general. Helping you succeed is what our team does best.