samedi 29 juin 2013

Print Spooler Stops Automatically in Windows 7 despite restarting => Solution

Since Windows Vista til Windows 7, after a period of several months of usage of the printers via a Local Network (LAN), the Windows print spooler stops automatically.
Fig. I : Topology of a small local area network  (LAN).
Orange is a French Telecom Supplier, SFR Neufbox is a French  FAI.

Microsoft Windows has not improved the Print Spooler, despite precious years: in fact, we had this kind of trouble regardless of the printer, either Canon Laser printer or Epson Stylus Color  inkjet printer.

After some search on Google, and some computer experiments, despite multiple reboots, the change of ownership of the file C: \Windows\System32\spoolsv.exe, restart Windows, as suggested by the forums on the net ... nothing cure the spooler's illness.

For over a year we did not find a miracle solution. The print spooler stops all the time, sometimes you can not even get a single page of the printer ...

Deeply analyzing our case, we observe that the Spooler starts to malfunction, ie, it automatically stops due to an unidentifiable error, for example, after installing the printer on a local network (LAN) and its daily use.

Based on this analysis, we guess that there would be errors in drivers, or driver files are damaged over time. So we dared to try in desperation radical solutions, but it worked ...

Here are the steps to try, who settled our problem, there is no guarantee of your success:

Print Spooler Repair Order

  1. Delete the files in C:\WINDOWS\system32\spool\PRINTERS\*.*,  ie, all files under the system directory C:\WINDOWS\system32\spool\PRINTERS\, without of course delete the directory itself.
    Fig.2: Directory PRINTERS\ of which the content is to be deleted.
  2. Delete the sub-directories and the files in C:\WINDOWS\system32\spool\drivers\*.*. You can leave the non-deletable files in place because of the protection of files in this directory, this has no effect, you delete files that you can.
    Fig.3: Directory drivers\ of which the content is to be deleted. All elements are selected with Ctrl-A, you press then the [Del] button on your keyboard.
  3. In \Control Panel\Hardware and Sound\Devices and Printers, delete all installed printers: Right-click on the printer icon/Remove Hardware.
  4. Restart Windows 7 Professional leaving the physical USB printer connected, Windows will automatically recognize all local printers on the USB ports, if you have common printer brands. In addition you have already installed at least once successfully the driver of all your local printers, printer drivers are probably already in the cache of Windows 7, so you do not need to download new drivers for your hardware . 
  5. Reinstall shared printers available by clicking on their icons from the Network Window. 
  6. Reinstall if you need PDFCreator to create PDF documents by printing, efficient and free software. 
The Print Spooler service will not stop automatically, printing can then proceed normally.

If you use the fax function in Windows, delete also the virtual printer named "Fax", because it does not function normally. To restore it, you must perform the following steps:

  1. In the Control Panel \\Control Panel\Programs\Turn Windows features on or off, remove first "printing and scanning documents\Windows Fax and Scan Service", restart Windows. 
  2. After the restart, the Windows  Fax Service virtual printer named "Fax" reappears, and works again for faxing.

Good printing and good fax!



Notes of interventions for memory, we promise to publish here new fault if there will be in the future:

  1.  Last Repaired Failure: the afternoon of Wednesday, May 15, 2013, reoccurrence of error of print spooler when printing through a local network of 3 pcs: A PC (Windows 7 Pro), B (Windows 7 Pro) on which the The printer is physically brahchée and C (Windows Vista Home). Printing took place from the PC to C Laser Printer B / W Canon LBP3000 connected to the PC B. The impression is good. Currieusement is the Spooler A PC that has failed, we can not print in PCs or through the LAN or locally, because all printers have disappeared from this machine. While local printing on PC B is operational. We had to redo the six steps "Repair Print Spooler Stopped". 
  2. Last Update : Thirsday 08/01/2013, everything still works perfectly without any trouble since the last repair. By painful experiences, we no longer attempt to print from the PC C Windows Vista Family, via the LAN, to the printer on PC B, because the failure is reproducible.

Voir la Version Française Spooler d'impression s'arrête...