Printer Problem

Question

My Epson Stylus Photo 890 has worked well with my Windows Vista PC. It recently stopped printing. In discussion with Epson Help I followed instructions to uninstall and re-install a printer driver. I can now print a test page and I can print from emails and in those respects the printer appears to be working normally. However I cannot print even the simplest document from routinely used applications like MS Word. The document appears in the printer queue window which says "printing" but nothing else happens. I have checked all the usual page set up issues. Even documents which have successfully printed before, no longer print.

Suggestions welcomed.

Thanks and regards

Ian T

Answer 1

Ian_Turner,

Thank you for visiting the Microsoft Answers community forum.

I have seen this issue a couple of times before and it always turns out to be something strange and unexpected and takes some time consuming troubleshooting to find the cause.  It could be a third party piece of software or driver that is causing an unexpected conflict, a service that seems totally unrelated that is not running that needs to be running, etc.  So let's start the process of elimination by doing a clean boot.  This will eliminate most third party startup processes and services.

Step 1: Perform a clean boot

Log on to the computer by using an account that has administrator rights.

Click Start, type msconfig.exe in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER to start the System Configuration Utility.

If you are prompted for an administrator password or for confirmation, type your password, or click Continue.

On the General tab, click Selective Startup, and then click to clear the Load startup items check box. (The Use Original Boot.ini check box is unavailable.)

On the Services tab, click to select the Hide all Microsoft services check box, and then click Disable all.

Note: Following this step lets Microsoft services continue to run. These services include Networking, Plug and Play, Event Logging, Error Reporting, and other services. If you disable these services, you may permanently delete all restore points. Do not do this if you want to use the System Restore utility together with existing restore points.

Click OK, and then click Restart.

Once your system restarts, try printing a test page from the Printer's properties page in control panel.  If that works, try printing a document from Word. 

If that resolved the issue, then you will have to enable one service at a time in msconfig until the printer fails so you will know which one is causing the conflict.

If this did not fix the issue, put your system back to normal and run the System File Checker:

To run the System File Checker tool, follow these steps:

Click Start, and then type cmd in the Start Search box.

Right-click cmd in the Programs list, and then click Run as administrator.

If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type your password or click Continue

At the command prompt, type the following line, and then press ENTER:

sfc /scannow

When the scan is complete, test to see whether the issue that you are experiencing is resolved.

Let us know how this works out for you.

Thank you,

---

Gloria

Microsoft Answers Support Engineer

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Answer 2

Hi,

I have similar situation with my printer. I am using a network HP LaserJet 2300 (hosted by a non-Intel Mac), and it used to work for me. Recently, it can only print test page, webpages, and Word documents okay, but not Exel, Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator. There are other Vista users who prints okay through the same printer. I tried your first suggestion and remove non-window service in msconfig utility, but the printer issue is unchanged.  I also tried out the second method, yet the system scan stopped at 77% and showed "Window Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation." No other error message was shown. Any other suggestion on how to repair it. Thanks.

Regards,

Walter