Printer

[swiftflo]

A friend of mine (genuinely) has a Dell Inspiron 531 computer connected to a
Dell AIO 948 printer and running Vista Home Premium. He has has loads of
problems with the printing from this set up.

Yesterday after the third call by Dell to try and sort out the printer
problems the Tech. support man turned off UAC and again the printer printed
okay, from MS works, Paint Shop Pro, Windows Photo gallery and would print
out from Windows Mail. My friend was told by the tech. guy that Dell
computers have a problem with printing with UAC turned on and until
Microsoft come up with an answer the printer will only work this way.

What do you think.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

I think the Dell tech is talking a load of (expletive deleted, fill in what
you want).

Dell computers running Home Premium should not differ from any other
computer running Home Premium. I still keep UAC enabled on ALL my PCs, and
all of them print just fine, albeit none of them are Dell units and I do not
have any Dell printers (which are actually rebadged Lexmark units if they
are inkjet all in ones).

Without looking at the PC in question, I don't know what bloatware Dell
installed on it... and I would suspect it was one of those programs stopping
the printing, rather than UAC. Is your friend an Administrator? Even if
he/she is not, once the Administrator has installed the printer correctly,
any User should be able to print just fine.

Do you have a printer you could take to your friend's home and try to
install it (temporarily) on their PC? At least then we can narrow down the
problem to either the setup of printer OR the setup of the PC. If you do
this, remember to take the latest Vista drivers for the printer with you!

 

[swiftflo]

The printer has been installed on another computer and works okay. Tomorrow
intend to install (with necessary drivers) another printer to the computer
and see if that will work with UAC turned on.

 

[swiftflo]

With regards my last email. I don't know what system the printer was
alleged to have been connected to, but when I tried it today it certainly
would not work with UAC turned on. I then disconnected it, installed drivers
for a Lexmark AIO that my friend had borrowed and tried printing with it,
this printed successfully (with UAC turned on) so I would assume the
original Dell AIO printer to be at fault, would you not agree.

 

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

I would certainly agree it's pointing to the Dell sofware to be at fault.

 

[swiftflo]

Thanks for your comments. My friend has now written to Dell to explain this
to them. Will report on what happens.