Cannot delete printer

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rob A.
  • Start date Start date
R

Rob A.

This is an minor problem but a major annoyance for me. I am trying to delete
one of the installed printers that shows up in control panel-> printers. If
i right click ->run as administrator-> delete, I am asked if I really want
to delete and after I click yes, nothing happens. If I open the printer,
after the printer name, it says, "access denied, unable to connect." If I
just hover the mouse over the printer after all this, it says "Printer
status: deleting Documents:6" even though no documents are listed in the
print queue. I have rebooted and this does not seem to effect things.

Don't know if it matters but the printer in a HP Officejet 7300 series.

Any suggestions would be appreciated
 
Rob said:
This is an minor problem but a major annoyance for me. I am trying to
delete
one of the installed printers that shows up in control panel-> printers.
If
i right click ->run as administrator-> delete, I am asked if I really
want
to delete and after I click yes, nothing happens. If I open the printer,
after the printer name, it says, "access denied, unable to connect." If I
just hover the mouse over the printer after all this, it says "Printer
status: deleting Documents:6" even though no documents are listed in the
print queue. I have rebooted and this does not seem to effect things.

Don't know if it matters but the printer in a HP Officejet 7300 series.

Any suggestions would be appreciated
Click to expand...

If no documents are listed in the print queue for that printer, stop the
print spooler service, delete the printer, restart the print spooler
service.

To do this, open an elevated cmd prompt:

Start Orb>Search box>type: cmd
When cmd appears above, right-click it and choose "run as Administrator".

At the command prompt, do:

net stop spooler [enter]

Go to the printers applet in Control Panel and delete the printer.

Then back in the command prompt, do:

net start spooler [enter]

Malke
 
Thanks for the reply but it did not work. When I tried to delete the
printer, I get an error message that I have to restart the local print
spooler or restart the machine. Restarting the print spooler obviously does
not work and restarting the machine also restart the print spooler.

Do the following additional facts matter?:
- this is a network printer
- the printer does still physically exist but I cannot seem to print from
this instance of the printer in the printer applet. I reinstalled t he
printer and the second instance of the printer works fine in the printer
applet.

Malke said:
Rob said:
This is an minor problem but a major annoyance for me. I am trying to
delete
one of the installed printers that shows up in control panel-> printers.
If
i right click ->run as administrator-> delete, I am asked if I really
want
to delete and after I click yes, nothing happens. If I open the printer,
after the printer name, it says, "access denied, unable to connect." If I
just hover the mouse over the printer after all this, it says "Printer
status: deleting Documents:6" even though no documents are listed in the
print queue. I have rebooted and this does not seem to effect things.

Don't know if it matters but the printer in a HP Officejet 7300 series.

Any suggestions would be appreciated
Click to expand...

If no documents are listed in the print queue for that printer, stop the
print spooler service, delete the printer, restart the print spooler
service.

To do this, open an elevated cmd prompt:

Start Orb>Search box>type: cmd
When cmd appears above, right-click it and choose "run as Administrator".

At the command prompt, do:

net stop spooler [enter]

Go to the printers applet in Control Panel and delete the printer.

Then back in the command prompt, do:

net start spooler [enter]

Malke
--
MS-MVP
Elephant Boy Computers
www.elephantboycomputers.com
Don't Panic!
Click to expand...
 
Rob said:
Thanks for the reply but it did not work. When I tried to delete the
printer, I get an error message that I have to restart the local print
spooler or restart the machine. Restarting the print spooler obviously
does not work and restarting the machine also restart the print spooler.

Do the following additional facts matter?:
- this is a network printer
- the printer does still physically exist but I cannot seem to print from
this instance of the printer in the printer applet. I reinstalled t he
printer and the second instance of the printer works fine in the printer
applet.
Click to expand...

I'm assuming this is a Workgroup computer and not part of a domain. If I'm
wrong, see your systems administrator for help.

It shouldn't matter whether this is a network printer but it might matter
that it is still in use in the second instance. Frankly, if the second
instance is working and you can set it as the default printer, I'd just
ignore the other one. Maybe one of the printing gurus has a better answer
for you.

Malke
 
I managed to solve the problem. On the other computer on this home network
(running XP) in the printer section it listed as one of the printers "Auto
[HP printer on the other computer]". I deleted this entry and when I
rebooted the Vista computer the "bad" printer entry disappeared.

Thanks for the help.
 
Rob said:
I managed to solve the problem. On the other computer on this home network
(running XP) in the printer section it listed as one of the printers "Auto
[HP printer on the other computer]". I deleted this entry and when I
rebooted the Vista computer the "bad" printer entry disappeared.
Click to expand...

I'm glad you got it sorted. Thanks very much for posting back with your
solution.

Malke
 
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