Setting up your Satellite

A step-by-step guide to unboxing and configuring your Satellite router for connecting and managing your fleet of printers.

 

Introduction

The Penny Black Satellite is a network router with our print software added for managing your printers.

It is designed to control up to 8 printers within your warehouse. You can have multiple Satellites installed and they can connect to your existing network and printers by both wired or wireless (although we always suggest wired where possible). 

The Satellite is flexible, and it requires you or your IT team to run through the following configuration steps to get started. 

Device model

The current Satellite model is the Gl-inet Flint 2 (GL-MT6000) and can be shipped worldwide.

1. Getting started

Unboxing

• In the box are the router, ethernet cable and a power adapter.
• Connect the power to the router to turn it on, and the light on the front will start flashing. 

Connect by WiFi

• On the bottom of the router, you will find the WiFi details including the SSID and WiFi Key (password).
• After a few seconds, the router will have properly booted up and you can use the wifi details to connect to it from your local device - computer, laptop or phone.

Access the router admin panel

• In your web browser go to http://192.168.8.1/

Initial Install

• Choose your language and hit Next

• Create an administration password that you will need to remember if you have to change the network setup in future:

2. Renaming the WiFi

In a busy warehouse, there can be a lot of WiFi devices. To make it easy to identify the Penny Black Satellite we recommend renaming the WiFi SSIDs.

• Select the WIRELESS menu option on the left
• For the 5 Ghz Wi-Fi tab, click the MODIFY button to open up the form for changes.
• Rename the Wi-Fi Name (SSID) field from the default to something like PennyBlack-5G. If you have more than one satellite you should label them separately, such as PennyBlack-1-5G and PennyBlack-2-5G.
• We recommend keeping the password unchanged as it is on a label on the device so easy to find.
• Apply the changes.

• If you connected via this network then you will now be disconnected. Wait until it has completed with a blank page then reconnect to the new network name.
• Scroll down and perform the same changes for the 2.4 Ghz form. 
• Following the same pattern as above, this time the WiFi Name (SSID) should be changed to just PennyBlack (without the -5G suffix) 

3. Setup internet access

The Satellite needs access to the internet. You can either use a wired ethernet connection or choose WiFi.

a. Wired ethernet internet connection

On the back of the router is a port labelled WAN, plug one side of the ethernet cable into this port and the other end into your network. The router will now establish a connection and get internet access.

If connected successfully you should see the Ethernet1 on the left-hand side turn green. You should also now be able to access the internet on the device which is connected to the router.

b. WiFi internet connection

If a wired connection is not possible you must setup a WiFi Repeater.  

• From the left navigation click the INTERNET menu link, from here you will see the following page with a Repeater section toward the bottom-left: 

• From this Repeater section click on the Connect link
• You will see a window popup which, after a moment, will be populated with the available networks.
• If you are on-site you can select your network to join. If you are off-site you can click Join Other Network and fill in the details manually.
• Enter the SSID and password for your network and hit Apply.
• If the network is in range you will see it connect and show network details:

4. Upgrade the Firmware

After connecting to the Internet, your router may have a firmware update available. This might show in a pop-up message or you can check from Upgrade under the SYSTEM menu:

If there is an upgrade, apply it. If the update fails, please wait for a few minutes and then retry.

5. Installing the Penny Black print client

• From the admin panel, go to Application > Plug-ins and click the Manage Sources button. You may need to wait for the page to finish loading first.

• Add a new source by filling in the boxes:
  • Name - enter pennyblack . It must be all lowercase with no spaces.
  • URL - enter your satellite package URL. This can be found on the Printers page from either the Merchant or 3PL Penny Black web apps.
    
    
    • Click on the ADD SATELLITE button
    • Use the COPY button to grab the URL
    

• • Paste the URL back into the router admin panel source page into the URL box

• • Click the "+" icon to add the source
• You should now see the new pennyblack source in the list:
  
• Click Apply at the bottom of the window
• Now hit the Refresh button from the Plug-ins page, this may take a minute
• Start typing in pennyblack and you should see pennyblack-agent in the table below.

• Click the Install button on the right-hand side of the row.

• After a minute you should be greeted with an Installation Succeeded message. You can close this window and the software will be ready.

6. Assign the Satellite to your Warehouse

Back in the Penny Black app, return to the Printers page. You will see the Satellite listed now as Unassigned. You will need to create a Warehouse to assign it to.

• Go to the Warehouses page from the menu
• Click the CREATE WAREHOUSE button in the top-right corner.
• Name your warehouse and enter address details, hit SAVE WAREHOUSE when done

Return to the printers page and you should now be able to assign the Satellite to your newly created warehouse. Select it from the drop-down list and hit ASSIGN:
The Satellite will now be assigned to that site and ready for printers to be connected:

7. Labelling the device

We recommend labelling the device with "Penny Black Satellite X" where X is the number shown in the app for this Satellite. This will help distinguish it from other devices in your warehouse. 

Next Steps

Your Satellite is now setup and ready for connecting printers. See our following guides for:

• Connecting printers to your Satellite
• Configuring print locations in the Penny Black apps