Print spooler keeps crashing

When I’m not writing comics or watching terrible films I also work as an IT consultant. Here’s a few things I’ve learned over the last 17 years.

Problem:

No printers show up in the printer section of control panel. This is a result of the print spooler crashing. if you go in and manually restart the print spooler it runs until you try to do anything related to the printer then crashes again.

Solution:

Usually this is the result of corrupt print drivers (possible virus infection causing the corruption. Make sure to run a quick malware scan). You may need to uninstall print drivers completely – including the registry entries.

If it is a local printer (My Computer), go to the following registry keys and delete the respective entries:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print\Environments\ Windows NT x86\ Drivers\Version-2\

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print\Printers\
If it is a network printer (network printer server or \\), go to the following registry keys and delete the respective and entries:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Printers\Connections\

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print\Providers\ LanMan Print Services\Servers\\Printers\

After the registry edit, you need to stop and restart the spooler service. At this point, you’ll be able to reinstall the printer driver correctly.

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