Printer Spooler

[nightrax]

OK - we are running Win2k Server, with Win XP machines as clients

l have recently installed a new HP 4350 printer to the network and we have at least another 10 network printers through out the business.

For some odd reasion the service keeps on stopping its self, it is set to automatic and started as the default, and the server does not get shut down. The problems did not start till a couple of days after l installed the new network printer.

l have checked eventid.net and cant find anything really conclusive.

Many thanks in advance !!

 

[nsanto17]

Try Removing the printer and see if the Issue goes away.

Make sure you are on SP4 .... I believe there were some issues that were fixed in SP4

Thanks

Nick

 

[nightrax]

Thanks for the reply nick, we are on SP4 - that would of been my first idea to remove that printer and see what happends, but everything was working for at lease 3-4 straight days before the spooler service decided to keep turning its self off. l have set the service at the moment to manual and that seems so far to be woking. It was originally set to automatic...

 

[danomac]

I just went through a round of this with our Terminal Server on Windows 2000 SBS SP4, and our new HP 1320n Laserjets.

The print drivers cause the spooler to crash (in our case it was up to 10 times _a day_. I called HP and they blamed Microsoft. The only thing that worked for me was to install the driver on each client locally (a pain), remove the driver from the server, and use the TS mapping feature (KB239088) to tell TS to use the OEM HP Laserjet 1100 driver for our 1320n printers. After doing this, I haven't had a single Spooler crash in 5 days and counting.

If you look in the error log, look for an event labeled 'Service Control Manager'. If you view the details, it will tell you what service crashed, and it's likely the Print Spooler. The last few events will tell you what happened right before the crash, and in my case it was always the new 1320n being accessed.

Ours was specifically complaining about the print processor; I tried changing it and the Terminal Server still crashed, but printing through the LAN seemed to be more stable.

You can try changing it to something else (go to Printer Properties -> Advanced Tab -> Print Processor button and changing it from whatever it is set to to 'WinPrint', which is Windows' Print Processor.) That may or may not work, and I'd remember what it was set to in case you need to switch it back.

You might want to check out these articles on Microsoft's KB:
KB239088
KB260142

Hope this helps.

 

[nightrax]

Many thanks danomac, l dont have the time to install the drivers on everyones PC yet. l was thinking of sharing the drivers on a common share so people can install the drivers them self.

l havent tryed changing to WinPrint yet might give it a go on two of them just to see what happends.

Currently l have set the spollers service to auto-restart if shutdone or stopped. That has happend once today and worked fine the service was only down for a min.

Thanks again,

AnDy

 

[danomac]

The other thing you could try doing is adding a OEM driver and port manually. That seems to work on a test PC of mine.

I installed the HP Laserjet 1100 driver on one or our workstations that prints to our 1320n, and it seems to work with no problem. The problem with this method is that you lose features this way; I can't duplex print.