Default Printer Problem

[Matt Schmunk]

We have had an ongoing printer problem on our Windows XP
computers. When we try to print from any application, it
never prints. The little printer icon shows in the
system tray and then goes away, but nothing prints. The
printers are set up to print directly to the printer's IP
address (Standard TCP/IP Port).

In order for users to print, they have to change their
default printer to another printer that is available and
then change the default back to the one they want to
print to.

I have tried re-installing the printers according to
previous posts I have seen on here so that nothing is
left before re-installing them. Still the same thing.

 

[Guest]

I have seen the same problem where I work. Yes, the crude way is to switch the default printer to whatever it is you need at the time, but I also understand that can be annoying and most users don't want to do that anyway

There are a couple ways to go about correcting this, you just have to make sure to adjust the instructions to whatever your starting point is

What you can do is
1. go to “Printers and Faxes†folder
2. start the “Add Printer†wizar
3. for any network printer after the first is setup you should add the printer as though it were a local printer.
This is done by selecting the option “Local printer attached to this computerâ€
Deselect the option to automatically detect plug and play printer
Click Next
4. On the next screen select the option that says “Create a new port†and choose the type to be “Local Portâ€
5. A little dialog box prompts you to “Enter a port nameâ€
Type in the location of the network printer. It will be formatted like \\ServerName\PrinterNam
Then click the OK button
6. The next screen prompts to Install Printer Software. Choose the appropriate option, whether it be “Have Disk†or manually picking out the printer manufacturer and type
7. Once that is done the next screen asks for you to give the printer a name
8. Next asks whether to share the printer. Choose “Do not share this printerâ€

The only things left are to decide whether or not to print a test page, and then the last window which shows you the details and waits for you to hit the “Finish†button

The other thing you can do is if you’ve left all the network printers setup in hopes of fixing it through a driver or something then you might be able to modify the properties of those printers similar to what was done above

Microsoft has a support article that described what to do, but I wasn’t able to get that to work. I’m not sure whether that’s because this applied to something else, or I just wasn’t following the steps correctly. The article can be found a
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;31407

What you would do is right click on the printer and click on “Propertiesâ€
Go to the “Ports†ta
Double click on LPT
Click Add Por
Double click Local Por
Type in \\ServerName\PrinterShar
Click O