Force print spooler service to stop/restart when it's unresponsive

Question

Force print spooler service to stop/restart when it's unresponsive

Anonymous

Our office has an HP plotter, whose driver (note that we have the latest version, straight from the HP website) seems to cause the Print Spooler service to become non-responsive sometimes. That in turn causes programs (most notably AutoCAD and Outlook) to lock up, as well as windows like the Devices and Printers dialog.

If I restart the print spooler service from "Services" in Computer Management, it goes back to working for at least a while- so at least I can workaround the problem. It's important to note however, that even using that method, it throws up an error dialog saying that the service was not responding. But since it's an issue with all our Vista installations that have that plotter installed, I need to have a more user-friendly method of restarting the service.

I wrote a basic .bat file with a net stop spooler command followed by a net start spooler command, but the problem is that, unlike with Computer Management, net stop doesn't seem to force the service to stop if it's not responding, and I can't find a way to make it force the stop command.

Is there a more powerful tool/switch available that I could script so users can easily stop and restart the spooler service when it's not responsive?

Thank you

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Answer accepted by question author

7 additional answers

Answer 1

Type sc /?

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"mgarrison" wrote in message news:d3d768a8-126b-4246-a4d8-ca6d8f4db6a7...

> Our office has an HP plotter, whose driver (note that we have the latest

> version, straight from the HP website) seems to cause the Print Spooler

> service to become non-responsive sometimes. That in turn causes programs

> (most notably AutoCAD and Outlook) to lock up, as well as windows like the

ers dialog.

>

> If I restart the print spooler service from "Services" in Computer

> Management, it goes back to working for at least a while- so at least I

> can workaround the problem. It's important to note however, that even

> using that method, it throws up an error dialog saying that the service

> was not responding. But since it's an issue with all our Vista

> installations that have that plotter installed, I need to have a more

> user-friendly method of restarting the service.

>

> I wrote a basic .bat file with a net stop spooler command followed by a

> net start spooler command, but the problem is that, unlike with Computer

> Management, net stop doesn't seem to force the service to stop if it's not

> responding, and I can't find a way to make it force the stop command.

>

> Is there a more powerful tool/switch available that I could script so

> users can easily stop and restart the spooler service when it's not

> responsive?

>

> Thank you

Answer 2

issue

The Print Spooler service is starting.

The Print Spooler service could not be started.

A system error has occurred.

System error 1067 has occurred.

The process terminated unexpectedly.

SERVICE_NAME: spooler

TYPE : 110 WIN32_OWN_PROCESS (interactive)

STATE : 1 STOPPED

(NOT_STOPPABLE, NOT_PAUSABLE, IGNORES_SHUTDOWN))

WIN32_EXIT_CODE : 1067 (0x42b)

SERVICE_EXIT_CODE : 0 (0x0)

CHECKPOINT : 0x0

WAIT_HINT : 0x0

Press any key to continue . . .

any words on this!!!!

You need to right click on the file, and "run as administrator"

Answer 3

Very nice- never knew that program existed!

Many thanks.

(in case anyone else needs it, here's the batch file I ended up with. Every once in a while, there's an error restarting the service- something about a duplicate endpoint, but running the script a second time seems to clear that as well).

@echo off

sc stop spooler

echo.

net start spooler

sc query spooler

pause

echo on

Answer 4

Hi mgarrison,

Good to know that you have got a fix for the issue. This will definitely help the other users. In case, if you need any assistance you may always post your questions along with your valuable suggestions in this forum.

Have a great day.

Regards

Praseetha. K.

Microsoft Answers Support Engineer

Visit our Microsoft Answers Feedback Forum and let us know what you think.

If this post helps to resolve your issue, please click the "Mark as Answer" or "Helpful" button at the top of this message. By marking a post as Answered, or Helpful you help others find the answer faster.

Answer 5

Taskkill /f

may help

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"DavidMCandy" wrote in message news:e5cbc1ef-8a27-439d-b6fb-9c16182c8b81...

> Type sc /?

>

> --

> ..

> --

> "mgarrison" wrote in message news:d3d768a8-126b-4246-a4d8-ca6d8f4db6a7...

>> Our office has an HP plotter, whose driver (note that we have the latest

>> version, straight from the HP website) seems to cause the Print Spooler

ice to become non-responsive sometimes. That in turn causes programs

>> (most notably AutoCAD and Outlook) to lock up, as well as windows like

>> the

> ers dialog.

>>

>> If I restart the print spooler service from "Services" in Computer

>> Management, it goes back to working for at least a while- so at least I

>> can workaround the problem. It's important to note however, that even

>> using that method, it throws up an error dialog saying that the service

>> was not responding. But since it's an issue with all our Vista

>> installations that have that plotter installed, I need to have a more

>> user-friendly method of restarting the service.

>>

>> I wrote a basic .bat file with a net stop spooler command followed by a

>> net start spooler command, but the problem is that, unlike with Computer

>> Management, net stop doesn't seem to force the service to stop if it's

>> not

>> responding, and I can't find a way to make it force the stop command.

>>

ailable that I could script so

>> users can easily stop and restart the spooler service when it's not

>> responsive?

>>

>> Thank you

>

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Force print spooler service to stop/restart when it's unresponsive

7 additional answers