I have a Compaq deskpro tower with Win98 SE. I have 2 printers working fine but I have a new printer I want to replace them with. When I start loading the printer drivers it gives me the spool32 error. I tried a diff printer and still get the same error and the lockup of the pc & have to reboot. The old printers that are in the system are running fine with no errors. I do not won't to uninstall the 2 till I get the new one working Thanks, Ken
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New Printer install - Spool32 error 2
- Thread starter wizbang99
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diogenes10
Technical User
Is the new printer the same brand as the old printers?
You're getting the error just from trying to install the printer-not after it is installed and trying to print to it?
You're getting the error just from trying to install the printer-not after it is installed and trying to print to it?
- Thread starter
- #4
Thank you for the help, it does not matter what printer I try to install. I get the the spool32 error (JUST SAYS YOU HAD A SPOOL32 ERROR then locksup)popup as it tries to install the driver for any printer I try to install.I reinstalled the spool32.exe in the win/sys folder. Installed the software off the hard drive in safe mode and still has the same error at the driver install part. I have 1 hp printer I installed when the pc was new and that works fine with no error when I use it. Thanks for the help. ken
diogenes10
Technical User
I'm hesitant to offer advice at this point because I'm afraid of messing you up.
Spool32 errors are tough-at least for me. And this is something different. We had trouble on a couple of systems at work and I had to do some reading - my problem here is I don't remember reading about anyone having a spool32 error from installing a printer-the various situations and solutions related to printers already installed and trying to print something.
The reason I asked if the printer you were trying to install was the same brand as what you're currently using is because I was speculating there might be some kind of conflict between the drivers-for example if you're using an hp now and trying to install another, maybe things are getting confused somehow and the solution lies in exactly what you dont want to do, removing the old printers first, and then installing the new one.
The other difficulty I have is that I have never worked with a compaq. I have dells at home and a generic at work.
With those computers and facing the situation you're facing, I would be considering the following:
1> using drive image or ghost to create a restorable image of the harddrive so I could put everything back the way it is now.
2> I would then remove all printers from the system.
(use the remove programs option in control panel for the first step and then look for other files and directories.)
3> I would then power the system down and reboot it and look to be sure printing stuff was gone. I would repeat this cycle until I thought I had all the device files for the particular brand of printer gone. For example on my work system, that would mean removing everything about an HP deskjet and laserjet.
4> I would then try to install the new printer and see what happened. If I had failure there, I would uninstall and consider whether there are older drivers or property settings I should look at. More specific suggestions there need a specific printer to talk about.
5> would google on specific error messages to try and find more ideas.
6> If no success at all, I would try to reinstall one of the old printers and if reinstalls of one or both of the old printers failed,
7 I would restore the drive using my image from step 1 and evaluate what happened to me and try to come up with a next thing to try.
The thing that concerns me about that is that I think I have read in other threads that at least some compaqs have a hidden partition with system restore information on it and I don't know how imaging and restoring affect that partition if there is one and I dont think you should try that until you know what the effects might be.
Spool32 errors are tough-at least for me. And this is something different. We had trouble on a couple of systems at work and I had to do some reading - my problem here is I don't remember reading about anyone having a spool32 error from installing a printer-the various situations and solutions related to printers already installed and trying to print something.
The reason I asked if the printer you were trying to install was the same brand as what you're currently using is because I was speculating there might be some kind of conflict between the drivers-for example if you're using an hp now and trying to install another, maybe things are getting confused somehow and the solution lies in exactly what you dont want to do, removing the old printers first, and then installing the new one.
The other difficulty I have is that I have never worked with a compaq. I have dells at home and a generic at work.
With those computers and facing the situation you're facing, I would be considering the following:
1> using drive image or ghost to create a restorable image of the harddrive so I could put everything back the way it is now.
2> I would then remove all printers from the system.
(use the remove programs option in control panel for the first step and then look for other files and directories.)
3> I would then power the system down and reboot it and look to be sure printing stuff was gone. I would repeat this cycle until I thought I had all the device files for the particular brand of printer gone. For example on my work system, that would mean removing everything about an HP deskjet and laserjet.
4> I would then try to install the new printer and see what happened. If I had failure there, I would uninstall and consider whether there are older drivers or property settings I should look at. More specific suggestions there need a specific printer to talk about.
5> would google on specific error messages to try and find more ideas.
6> If no success at all, I would try to reinstall one of the old printers and if reinstalls of one or both of the old printers failed,
7 I would restore the drive using my image from step 1 and evaluate what happened to me and try to come up with a next thing to try.
The thing that concerns me about that is that I think I have read in other threads that at least some compaqs have a hidden partition with system restore information on it and I don't know how imaging and restoring affect that partition if there is one and I dont think you should try that until you know what the effects might be.
TekTippy4U
Technical User
Are you installing through Printers Folder>Add Printer or are you popping in the CD and running the setup.exe(self-install Program)?...and running from that..I say this because windows can properly adjust your resources.....
It seems one of the printers is trying to spool a print job while you're loading new drivers....or a Com/Portshare/capture problem?.....The new one may be trying to capture the port which is occupied by your default printer....no?
It seems one of the printers is trying to spool a print job while you're loading new drivers....or a Com/Portshare/capture problem?.....The new one may be trying to capture the port which is occupied by your default printer....no?
diogenes10
Technical User
More reflection:
one of the things to try for spool32 errors is dropping the spooler and going to printing direct.
Maybe you could try changing the current printers to printing direct and then try installing the new printer again. If the install goes through, I dont know what the possibility is of spool32 errors becoming more widespread.
Under configure port during printer setup, I see an option to spool dos jobs. You could also try unchecking that.
Another suggestion would be to try the driver without the toolbox. I think that's just the inf file.
Also maybe an older driver. For example on hp laserjets if you're trying to install a pcl6 driver and having trouble, folks would recommend a pcl5e driver(I've done that myself as a temporary solution), and I've seen one or two threads where people have gone back to laserjet 4 or laserjet 3 drivers to deal with various problems.
On the off chance that win98 has corrupted the file on the harddrive, you could try replacing it from the cd and then running the safe mode install from the harddrive again.
one of the things to try for spool32 errors is dropping the spooler and going to printing direct.
Maybe you could try changing the current printers to printing direct and then try installing the new printer again. If the install goes through, I dont know what the possibility is of spool32 errors becoming more widespread.
Under configure port during printer setup, I see an option to spool dos jobs. You could also try unchecking that.
Another suggestion would be to try the driver without the toolbox. I think that's just the inf file.
Also maybe an older driver. For example on hp laserjets if you're trying to install a pcl6 driver and having trouble, folks would recommend a pcl5e driver(I've done that myself as a temporary solution), and I've seen one or two threads where people have gone back to laserjet 4 or laserjet 3 drivers to deal with various problems.
On the off chance that win98 has corrupted the file on the harddrive, you could try replacing it from the cd and then running the safe mode install from the harddrive again.
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