Microsoft Print to PDF not working after Windows update to Windows Server 2019

Luke Tomczyk 1

We have been having an issue for the past 2 months where on all 4 of our Windows Server 2019 RDSH, the Microsoft Print to PDF feature stopped working along with other built in printers. At first we could not locate the issue, but some time later, after uninstalling the Windows updates, the feature started to work again.

Some things we have done...
-Uninstalled the printer and tried to reinstall. We are always presented with "Unable to install, Element not found".
-When clicking on the properties of the PDF printer, it mentions that the driver is not installed (although we believe it is). When going through the wizard to install the driver, we get the same error listed above.
-Performed a full reset and fresh windows install on the server. This works, until the Windows updates are installed, which breaks the printer again.

It almost seems like whatever is in this update is breaking any/all of the Type 4 printer drivers.
Does anyone know a fix for this issue? We would like to have the updates installed to stay up to date and safe, but the PDF printer is a must have.
Thanks!

Alex C 56 Reputation points

2021-02-13T20:43:59.773+00:00

Same issue here. I can't find a fix. Tried uninstalling all recent updates, but that didn't help. I couldn't uninstall some of the security updates. I deleted the printers (XPS, PDF, OneNote) thinking that deleting all of them and starting from scratch with Type 4 drivers might help, but it didn't. Now I can't even install them. If I select Use the driver that is currently installed, I get "Unable to install printer. The handle is invalid." If I select Replace the current driver, I get "Printer driver was not installed. Element not found."
RogerWA 1 Reputation point

2021-07-20T00:16:32.953+00:00

We are using Windows 2016 Server standard on two different domains. We have two 2016 server standard RDS servers where the Microsoft Print to PDF stopped working on 7/15/21 when the July patches were installed. The same behavior is happening with those servers as mentioned by others here. The XPS writer and Send to OneNote printers also stopped working. We tried everything that has been mentioned here to try and resolve the issue but we have been unsuccessful.

If anyone has a potential fix, I am hoping they will share.
mrbenjamine20 16 Reputation points

2021-09-13T16:59:53.677+00:00

Just checking in to see if anyone has made any progress on this issue. This happened to our RDS hosts last April 2020, so we rebuilt the RDS environment with new hosts (fully patched), which worked fine until July 2021, when the EXACT same thing started happening. The impacted servers cannot install any Type4 drivers and display Element not Found. Rolling back the updates resolves the issue, but given the recent print spooler exploits, this is not an option. It would appear that for whatever reason, at some point installing the latest updates is causing the print to pdf (or some other built-in driver) to become corrupt.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Steven O365. Rackley 1 Reputation point

2021-09-14T17:33:24.103+00:00

I think this is a different problem. This is caused by the printnightmare fix that Microsoft deployed. The patch now requires that all users have Admin rights to use Point and Click or GPO deployed printers. There are GPO entries that can be set to override the new "fix" but the turn the vulnerability back on. I worked aroung this by only allowing driver instalation from within my forest.

Users can only point and print to machines in their forest: Enabled

And the following registry update:
RestrictDriverInstallationToAdministrators (Order: 1)hide
Generalhide
Action Update
PropertiesHive HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
Key path SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Printers\PointAndPrint
Value name RestrictDriverInstallationToAdministrators
Value type REG_DWORD
Value data 0x0 (0)
mrbenjamine20 16 Reputation points

2021-09-14T17:43:38.803+00:00

This has nothing to do with the recent security updates unfortunately.
Eduardo Hafner 6 Reputation points

2022-07-12T19:53:38.907+00:00

I need help, I'm having the same error, I've tried all the options. My Windows Server 2019 I searched all the forums and didn't find any viable answer.

8 answers

mrbenjamine20 16 Reputation points

2021-09-21T19:50:00.13+00:00

Quick update- making a bit of progress on this (I think).

One thing I noticed was that the ntprint.inf file was referencing ntprint.inf_x86... for the active driver reference on the problematic machine, ntprint.inf_x64... on a working machine

I did the following and so far printing is back to normal for Type-4 drivers-

1- ran "pnputil /enum-drivers" from a command prompt
2- used psexec to elevate and run regedit as system
3- investigated the - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\DRIVERS\DriverDatabase\DriverInfFiles\ntprint.inf
4- updated the (Default) value to include - ntprint.inf_x86_6fbb4b09e9354bf2 and ntprint.inf_amd64_6fbb4b09e9354bf2
5- updated the Active value to - ntprint.inf_amd64_6fbb4b09e9354bf2

Note- the exact values of ntprint.inf_x86 and _64 might be specific to build or updates installed, I'm not sure that they are universal to 2016. I used the values that existed in the DriverStore - C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository on my servers.

Not sure if this fix will do the trick long term, but so far after scrubbing out old printers, drivers, and pretty much cleaning out all registry / driver on the server its the only thing that has looked promising. Hopefully this will help point someone else in the right direction.
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2 people found this answer helpful.
Antonio Gianni 21 Reputation points

2021-09-23T01:22:58.14+00:00

Unreal, I have been messing with this all day and this worked. Thank you very much.

Pavlin Ivanov 1 Reputation point

2021-09-23T13:19:56.87+00:00

All the steps were as described, but it is still not working for me :(

MSO-L 1 Reputation point

2022-12-13T21:45:33.69+00:00

Totally worked for me, today on a Windows 2019 server. But weirdely the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\DRIVERS was not listed in the registry, even with psexec in an elevated prompt as system (i suppose thats linked to the fact that the server is in an enterprise domain?) . To list thoses keys I had to stop the server and start it without network, logon with local admin creds, HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\DRIVERS was now listed. I still had to use psexec in elevated prompt as system to edit the keys, without this trick you'll got access denied errors.

Louis Ouellet 0 Reputation points

2023-04-19T22:43:50.9666667+00:00

@MSO-L Actually you should be able to achieve this using the local administrator. Username : .\Administrator

IT BWVA 0 Reputation points

2023-07-18T06:15:35.7066667+00:00

Thank you very much. This solution works for me. Great!. After hours of browsing for a solution this was successful.
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Mike E 6 Reputation points

2021-03-08T07:58:04.413+00:00

Hi,

Exactly the same problem here with a RDS Sever (2019).

Any news or updates about this case ?
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1 person found this answer helpful.
Luke Tomczyk 1 Reputation point

2021-03-15T15:39:52.743+00:00

We are currently working with MS support on the case now. Hopefully some resolution will come of it. They we able to remote to our environment and see the issue first had, where after updating, the type 4 printers fail. Any tricks they attempted did not work, so hoping that development can come up with some remediation.
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Alex Carlock 151 Reputation points

2021-03-08T14:29:42.543+00:00

We never found a solution. Had to install a 3rd party PDF Printer.
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Jenny Yan-MSFT 9,321 Reputation points

2020-12-31T02:15:46.647+00:00

Hi,
1.If the print driver does install on the server, use the print backup utility c:\windows\system32\spool\tools\printbrm.exe to backup the driver and then restore the driver to the machine with the issue adding the driver to the driverstore.
printbrm -b -f backup.printerexport
printbrm -r -s printserver -f backup.printerexport
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/402a8e6d-a873-4cf7-8625-a8c50ef6ba47/printer-driver-was-not-installed-element-not-found?forum=winserverprint

2.There is a similar thread in QA forum that the user finally choose higher version of another PDF printer as workaround.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/138777/windows-updates-kill-print-to-pdf-function-kb45747.html

3.What is the patched KB that has broken the PDF printer and you could post the details in user voice forum for the product team to check further.
https://windowsserver.uservoice.com/forums/295047-general-feedback

Hope this helps and please help to accept as Answer if the response is useful.

Thanks,
Jenny
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Luke Tomczyk 1 Reputation point

2021-01-04T14:02:28.733+00:00

Hi Jenny,

Unfortunately, option 1 does not fix the issue when the Windows updates are still installed.

As far as option 2 is concerned, we do not have a second installed PDF printer. We strictly use the Microsoft built in "Print to PDF" function.

I will be testing which exact update is breaking the drivers and then relay that message to the user voice forum.

Thanks,
Luke

Jenny Yan-MSFT 9,321 Reputation points

2021-01-05T05:16:53.987+00:00

Hi Luke,
Thanks for the update. It is appreciated for you to update the KB details here and we would like to test in VMs and reproduce your issue if possible.

Best Regards,
Jenny

Luke Tomczyk 1 Reputation point

2021-01-14T14:46:25.227+00:00

Hi Jenny,

Sorry for the delayed response. I was waiting for the January 2021 patches to see if the issue would resolve itself. Unfortunately, it did not, but we have captured the patch that seems to be causing the issue.

Per testing, once we uninstall KB4598230, the print to PDF (along with all other type 4 printers), begin to work again. Any ideas on why this patch may be interfering with type 4 drivers/printers?

Thanks!
Luke
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acira 16 Reputation points

2021-01-18T11:56:31.76+00:00

I am having the same issue on Server 2016 RDSH
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/166106/microsoft-print-to-pdf-stops-working-on-2016-rdsh.html

Any cumulative update since breaks it for me.
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Luke Tomczyk 1 Reputation point

2021-01-19T13:43:55.087+00:00

We're seeing the same thing here. Hoping that there is some sort of workaround identified or the patch itself modified. Let me know if you here anything!

acira 16 Reputation points

2021-01-19T16:54:42.593+00:00

I think it tries to use GPU resources to raster, I wonder if it has something to do with the RemoteFX vGPU vulnerability mitigation.

Luke Tomczyk 1 Reputation point

2021-01-21T15:31:37.667+00:00

That's an idea I hadn't even thought of. That could have some potential.
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