sorrel Posted October 21, 2009 Share Posted October 21, 2009 Microsoft, apparently, charges $49 just to send an email to their tech support department. That's why I decided to ask you guys instead. I have an HP printer and am running Vista. A few months ago, I suddenly started getting errors about the "print spooler." After a lot of email exchanges with HP, the "print spooler" error no longer appears, but now I cannot install the printer drivers and the computer doesn't recognize the printer. When I try to install the driver, the installation stalls, saying repeatedly, "Make sure the printer is turned on and connected to the computer." (It is.) If I try to print something, Windows says, "You need to install a printer" (or something like that.) HP told me it is no longer their problem and that I should contact Microsoft. That's when I discovered that I could buy a whole new Vista-compatible printer for what it would cost to contact Microsoft. Any ideas before I buy a new printer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AirMarshall Posted October 21, 2009 Share Posted October 21, 2009 Yes: Windows 7 ! Don't feel bad. HP makes great printers and suck-ass (that's a technical term) driver software. Top that with Vista being behind the eight ball for drivers since day one. several possiblities: -Do a registry clean up. There is freeware available for this. CCcleaner is one. -Reinstall/repair Vista. It really sounds like a corruption of the Vista printing stuff if you are adventurous Win7 comes out next week. Or buy the printer. Good luck! a.m. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nalgas Posted October 21, 2009 Share Posted October 21, 2009 Additionally, depending on how old the printer is, it may never have proper Vista/Win7 support if they can't be bothered to update the drivers. It's cheaper to buy a new printer than to just replace the ink cartridge half the time, so aside from it being horribly wasteful, that's probably the easiest solution if it starts getting to be too much work to get the current one working. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sorrel Posted October 21, 2009 Author Share Posted October 21, 2009 Thanks guys for the input. The printer is 2-3 yrs old. I already tried a registry cleanup to no effect. I think buying a new one is probably going to be the best solution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mudpuppy Posted October 21, 2009 Share Posted October 21, 2009 Uninstall Vista SP2, as it breaks damned near everything. Which is probably behind the sudden death of a previously functioning printer. SP2 caused my laptop to stop recognizing it's own internal speakers. I'm gonna burn Redmond, WA to the ground, and then buy a Mac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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