Networking dies after installing 2nd HP printer

[John Smith]

Looking for help in deciding the best way to restore network functionality.

Yesterday morning, my Toshiba Tecra 8100 laptop W2k SP3, running 3Com 10/100
ethernet card, w/ HP P1100 printer driver installed, worked fine.

I went to a friend's house and he has a new HP 7110 All-in-One
printer/fax/scanner/copier so I decided to install the software for it.

The HP software repeatedly died during install. Finally I simply plug the
printer USB cable in, let W2k Detect New Hardware, and only install the
printer driver and the printer works. All through this I am not connected to
a network at all (he only has dialup).

I go home and try to use my DSL connection and my P1100 printer. Both worked
fine earlier in the day before I tried installing the HP 7110. Now neither
works from my laptop.

I swap ethernet cards in the laptop (to a Xircom card which I had previously
used and whose drivers were still installed) - no connectivity. I try
different cables and network outlets, without luck.

I try my D-Link 802.11G card to connect to the wireless network in the house
(drivers also previously installed and worked fine) - again no connectivity.

All the other computers (6) in the house have connectivity, both wired and
wireless ones.

So I decide to call HP tech support to see what, if anything is going on
with the printer drivers. Turns out that HP printer drivers have various bad
interactions with one another under some circumstances - some models'
drivers cannot peacfully co-exist with others on the same system. With
others, the installation order of the drivers is critical.

HP walked me through the registry to uninstall the 7110 printer drivers but
neither my networking or P1100 worked after that was done.

I can't imagine how my network could become corrupt installing a lousy
printer driver and maybe it was truly just coincidence, but now I am stuck
looking for advice as to how to recover network connectivity.

My network is plain vanilla - DHCP served.
When I look at Network Properties for the TCP/IP connection, all appears
normal. I cannot ping the Toshiba laptop from any other computer.

Is there any way to diagnose or 'repair' the network files short of
re-installing W2k and then applying all subsequent patches?

Thanks.

 

[David Dickinson]

What does ipconfig /all report? Are there any clues in the Event Log? Are
any services disabled that should be manual or automatic? Are you convinced
that the driver and software for the 7110 is completely wiped off the
system? Have you tried reinstalling the original NIC? (Why did you try
installing a different NIC?)

 

[John Smith]

What does ipconfig /all report? Are there any clues in the Event Log?

Ipconfig didn't know about any nic. Didn't check the error log.

Are any services disabled that should be manual or automatic?

Many HP printers have a 'monitor' program that loads at startup, checking
for printer presence, ink levels, etc... HP told me that if one of these is
running when you try to install another HP printer, then the install can
fail in unpredicatable ways...(they don't have good error handling and tests
built into their install programs), and only some newer printers can
co-exist together (according to HP). Some Automatic HP startup services were
disabled on the advice of HP.

Are you convinced that the driver and software for the 7110 is completely

wiped off the system?

Was walked through the registry by an HP tech to ensure that everything was
cleaned out.


Have you tried reinstalling the original NIC? (Why did you try installing
a different NIC?)

My config profiiles were set up to permit booting 3 different ways - with a
3com card, a xircom card, and a d-link wireless card



Have wiped the system clean and reinstalled almost everything from scratch
(excpet the HP printers). So far everything is working correctly.


I know this is a Windows Update question, but what the heck...

Have W2k at SP2 right now with zero (0) critical updates installed. Can
choose to install SP3 or SP4 but there are also about 30 Critical updates
available at windowsupdate.microsoft.com. What is the correct order to
install service packs and the critical updates?


TIA