network printer help

[Dry then Catch]

my mom is trying to use her (personal) laptop to connect to her company's network so she can print.  She suspects her contract IT guy is milking them for hours as he claims a XP Media edition cannot network to an XP Professional. 

I know most of you IT guys are at a higher IT architecture than this, but condescend for me for one moment. 

Is this guy right (yes/no)?

Does it make sense to you of what our IT guy say about my printer:
Mom

Victor: Hi Catchr's mom
  Just saw your email about network printers
3:12 PM The problem is you have xp media edition not professional on your laptop so it's not a operating system that can join a domain. So the only other thing you can do is connect to the network via cable and then go to printers and double click on the network printer and enter your hospice domain id and password every time your reboot your computer. Once you put in your id and password you should have no problem printing to the printer. It worked for me so it should work for you.
3:13 PM so connect the laptop to the network cable. go to printers and double click on the network printer you need exec1 or exec2, and enter your hospice id and password. and then print.
3:14 PM you will have to logon to that printer everytime you reboot your computer.
  with hospice id and password.

[BigDun]

Yes, if she is connecting to a printer that is on computer in domain, she will have to authenticate to the computer with a domain login name and password every time she initially wants to use the printer. There may be a box that allows the computer to remember the login name and password, but there may also not be a box to remember that stuff.

[Dry then Catch]

thank you very much.  Now I see you were worth the relocation.

[swolt]

Yes, if she is connecting to a printer that is on computer in domain, she will have to authenticate to the computer with a domain login name and password every time she initially wants to use the printer. There may be a box that allows the computer to remember the login name and password, but there may also not be a box to remember that stuff.

agreed. XP media center SHOULD be able to get on a domain, but this is microsoft for you.