Weird Printer Issues

  • Thread starter Thread starter Karl Burrows
  • Start date Start date
K

Karl Burrows

Hi!

I am working with a small non profit meals on wheels group and we have been
upgrading a few computers. One is for the bookkeeper. They have a really
old HP LaserJet 5P (date on back was 1995). Anyway, it worked great just
plugging it in. They have an old DOS program that runs the meal delivery
program and PeachTree for accounting. Anyway, she wanted a faster printer
for the reports and checks, so we switched it out with another one in
another location.

It worked fine with PeachTree, Word, etc. but would not run the DOS program
reports because it was USB. So, I proceeded to uninstall the newer printer
and add the older LaserJet. This time, it would not print anything. It
powered on, but just gave me a message that there was an error printing
every time you tried to print anything, including test pages. I did finally
figure out that it would print when you rebooted the computer. I tried
uninstalling the printer, uninstalling the LPT1 port, updating the drivers,
etc. If I delete it and reboot, it installs it again fine, so there is
communication. I tried about everything turning off bi-direction
communications, checking ECP in BIOS, etc. as well.

Did something corrupt the printer spooler or the driver? Because the driver
is built in to Windows, it tried to install every time you boot. Even the
HP drivers didn't work, including trying other printers in the same family
(like 4Plus, etc.) Only printing when the computer restarts makes me think
something with the spooler is fowled up.

Any suggestions? Thanks!
 
Karl said:
Hi!

I am working with a small non profit meals on wheels group and we have been
upgrading a few computers. One is for the bookkeeper. They have a really
old HP LaserJet 5P (date on back was 1995). Anyway, it worked great just
plugging it in. They have an old DOS program that runs the meal delivery
program and PeachTree for accounting. Anyway, she wanted a faster printer
for the reports and checks, so we switched it out with another one in
another location.

It worked fine with PeachTree, Word, etc. but would not run the DOS program
reports because it was USB. So, I proceeded to uninstall the newer printer
and add the older LaserJet. This time, it would not print anything. It
powered on, but just gave me a message that there was an error printing
every time you tried to print anything, including test pages. I did finally
figure out that it would print when you rebooted the computer. I tried
uninstalling the printer, uninstalling the LPT1 port, updating the drivers,
etc. If I delete it and reboot, it installs it again fine, so there is
communication. I tried about everything turning off bi-direction
communications, checking ECP in BIOS, etc. as well.

Did something corrupt the printer spooler or the driver? Because the driver
is built in to Windows, it tried to install every time you boot. Even the
HP drivers didn't work, including trying other printers in the same family
(like 4Plus, etc.) Only printing when the computer restarts makes me think
something with the spooler is fowled up.

Any suggestions? Thanks!
Click to expand...

See if the information on this page helps:

http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders/printfromdos.htm

Steve
 
That may fix the DOS issue, but now it only prints when you reboot for any
application. Thanks!

Karl said:
Hi!

I am working with a small non profit meals on wheels group and we have
been
upgrading a few computers. One is for the bookkeeper. They have a really
old HP LaserJet 5P (date on back was 1995). Anyway, it worked great just
plugging it in. They have an old DOS program that runs the meal delivery
program and PeachTree for accounting. Anyway, she wanted a faster printer
for the reports and checks, so we switched it out with another one in
another location.

It worked fine with PeachTree, Word, etc. but would not run the DOS
program
reports because it was USB. So, I proceeded to uninstall the newer
printer
and add the older LaserJet. This time, it would not print anything. It
powered on, but just gave me a message that there was an error printing
every time you tried to print anything, including test pages. I did
finally
figure out that it would print when you rebooted the computer. I tried
uninstalling the printer, uninstalling the LPT1 port, updating the
drivers,
etc. If I delete it and reboot, it installs it again fine, so there is
communication. I tried about everything turning off bi-direction
communications, checking ECP in BIOS, etc. as well.

Did something corrupt the printer spooler or the driver? Because the
driver
is built in to Windows, it tried to install every time you boot. Even the
HP drivers didn't work, including trying other printers in the same family
(like 4Plus, etc.) Only printing when the computer restarts makes me
think
something with the spooler is fowled up.

Any suggestions? Thanks!
Click to expand...

See if the information on this page helps:

http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders/printfromdos.htm

Steve
 
Karl said:
That may fix the DOS issue, but now it only prints when you reboot for any
application. Thanks!
Click to expand...

Remove all printers, delete all *.tmp files you can (don't rely on Disk
Cleanup - it doesn't!), do a CHKDSK /F, and start over.

Windows has forever been plagued by disk errors, corrupted drivers and
orphaned *.tmp files causing all sorts of printing problems from
applications.

Steve
 
Thanks! I'll give it a try Monday and let you know!

Karl said:
That may fix the DOS issue, but now it only prints when you reboot for any
application. Thanks!
Click to expand...

Remove all printers, delete all *.tmp files you can (don't rely on Disk
Cleanup - it doesn't!), do a CHKDSK /F, and start over.

Windows has forever been plagued by disk errors, corrupted drivers and
orphaned *.tmp files causing all sorts of printing problems from
applications.

Steve
 
"Windows has forever been plagued by disk errors, corrupted drivers and
orphaned *.tmp files causing all sorts of printing problems from
applications."

Actually, it turns out that these problems have causes that are usually (in
no particular order):

Users disconnecting power without going thru a shutdown process.
Mis behaving applications and background software.
Hardware problems

It is true that early windows versions had problems with memory management,
and this did cause system lockups.
 
Chuck said:
"Windows has forever been plagued by disk errors, corrupted drivers and
orphaned *.tmp files causing all sorts of printing problems from
applications."

Actually, it turns out that these problems have causes that are usually (in
no particular order):

Users disconnecting power without going thru a shutdown process.
Mis behaving applications and background software.
Hardware problems

It is true that early windows versions had problems with memory management,
and this did cause system lockups.
Click to expand...

All very true. Allow me to rephrase.

Windows printing problems in my experience are most often caused by
orphaned tmp files, corrupted drivers and file system errors (even minor
errors).

Steve
 
Still has the same issues. I even downloaded the XP Resource Kit and ran
the cleanspl.exe to clean up all the spooler info (deleted all the printers,
rebooted, ran cleanspl, rebooted). The printer installs automatically on
reboot, but will only print on shutdown. I also deleted all the files in
the system32 spooler folder and that didn't work either.

Any other suggestions? Thanks for the help!!

Chuck said:
"Windows has forever been plagued by disk errors, corrupted drivers and
orphaned *.tmp files causing all sorts of printing problems from
applications."

Actually, it turns out that these problems have causes that are usually
(in
no particular order):

Users disconnecting power without going thru a shutdown process.
Mis behaving applications and background software.
Hardware problems

It is true that early windows versions had problems with memory
management,
and this did cause system lockups.
Click to expand...

All very true. Allow me to rephrase.

Windows printing problems in my experience are most often caused by
orphaned tmp files, corrupted drivers and file system errors (even minor
errors).

Steve
 
Karl said:
Still has the same issues. I even downloaded the XP Resource Kit and ran
the cleanspl.exe to clean up all the spooler info (deleted all the printers,
rebooted, ran cleanspl, rebooted). The printer installs automatically on
reboot, but will only print on shutdown. I also deleted all the files in
the system32 spooler folder and that didn't work either.

Any other suggestions? Thanks for the help!!
Click to expand...

Perhaps there is some process or program running in the background that
interferes with the printing and when you go to shutdown the OS starts
ending processes, the interfering one ends and then the spooler prints.

Do you by chance have any of the HP printer bloatware installed on the
machine? Removing a printer & driver will not uninstall HP (or other
brands of printer bloatware) printing utilities and if present they may
be the cause of the problem.

Steve
 
Turns out I had to do an in-place upgrade of XP to get everything back and
working. I also found a great program that will let you print to DOS from a
USB printer:

http://www.dosprn.com/

Worked like a charm and I am back up and running. I think the spooler was
messed up as well as having a corrupt driver or 2. It got to the point no
printer would install properly. I did a sfc and that didn't work, so the
upgrade fixed whatever dll or inf file was messing things up.

Thanks for the assist!

Karl said:
Still has the same issues. I even downloaded the XP Resource Kit and ran
the cleanspl.exe to clean up all the spooler info (deleted all the
printers,
rebooted, ran cleanspl, rebooted). The printer installs automatically on
reboot, but will only print on shutdown. I also deleted all the files in
the system32 spooler folder and that didn't work either.

Any other suggestions? Thanks for the help!!
Click to expand...

Perhaps there is some process or program running in the background that
interferes with the printing and when you go to shutdown the OS starts
ending processes, the interfering one ends and then the spooler prints.

Do you by chance have any of the HP printer bloatware installed on the
machine? Removing a printer & driver will not uninstall HP (or other
brands of printer bloatware) printing utilities and if present they may
be the cause of the problem.

Steve
 
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