HP 2600n/2605dn Printing Problems

[Chuckster]

I'm having a God awful time with these printers today. All of a sudden nobody is able to print and nor can I for that matter. Funny thing is, you can print what ever from the server!

Bi-directional support has always been disabled since the time of dawn.
IP addresses are fine.
I've even gone into the registry (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS NT\CurrentVersion\Print\Printer\[name of printer])... and edited the value 'Print Processor' and replaced it with 'WinPrint'. This worked fine if you're printing for the first time after the changes have been made. Again, after that, nothing happens.

New drivers were installed. Firmware upgrade has been performed on every HP printer to no avail.

Print Spooler service has been restarted. It's even set up to restart the services should it not start in the first place.

Factory reset solved nothing. A hard reset (pushing a button on the board) also did nothing other than making me wait and looking like a right numpty in front of my colleagues.

Any ideas what I can try next?

[witch]

Maybe something to do with the drivers not being seen by local machines - server is OK because they are actually on the server. Not sure how all that works. I have got these printers myself and I have found that the old 'switch them off for a bit' and unplug them seems to work - presume you've tried that?
What is the message you are getting? Are they all trying to print different things or is it just one?

[Chuckster]

Hey Witch,

I've tried the usual method of switching them off and on again and re-inputting the IP addresses but these proved futile today. In the past it has always worked, to say the least.

Sadly, there are/is no error messages on a client's workstation, the event viewer or on the server. Every workstation I've tested it from always says in its balloon format that it successfully sent to the printer. How peculiar, eh. It's now got me stumped and I don't know what else to try. All the other non-HP printers on the network (Brother, Ricoh and Dell) are working fine. I've had these 2600n and 2605dn for almost 3 years and I've never experienced anything quite like it until this morning.

[dhicks]

Funny thing is, you can print what ever from the server!

You've tried resetting the print server, of course? Any time skew between the print server and domain controller? Are any other printers handled by the print server using the same driver, or a vaugly related driver (i.e. one that might share a DLL)? If one of our HP 1100 / 1200 inkjets gets jammed then they all stop working as an error message for one printer seems to affect them all - seems to be something to do with Windows Server 2003 not separating print drivers in memory very well. What OS is your print server running? What driver are you using for the printers - are you using the HP Universal Print Driver? If not, try it, if so, try using a device-specific one. You have enough free disk space on the server?

--
David Hicks

[Chuckster]

When you say reset I take it you mean restart? If so, I've done this on numerous occasions. The OS is Win 2003 Std 32-bit, with 17GB free space. All the drivers are specific to that printer and not one of them is using a universal driver.

I've spotted 2 x 2600n printing fine.

If that's the case then why aren't the others? I have checked for lose connections but the NICs indicates there's still yet life in them. Pinging them hasn't shown up as unpingable.

It's really gotten be confused now.

Since the print server is a VM, and I do weekly image backups on a Friday, I'm going to restore the image to the latest copy as I know everything was working honky-dory that day (last Friday) - and on Monday.

[dhicks]

When you say reset I take it you mean restart? If so, I've done this on numerous occasions.

Sorry, restart, yes. Oh well, worth checking :-)

The OS is Win 2003 Std 32-bit, with 17GB free space. All the drivers are specific to that printer and not one of them is using a universal driver.

Is one machine jammed, stopping all the others printing - this seems to be the problem with our Windows Server 2003 print server. You could try the HP Universal Print Driver, see if that gets you any better results.

I've spotted 2 x 2600n printing fine.

Now they're just doing it to annoy you...

--
David Hicks

[Chuckster]

These printers are going to be the end of me, if they have it their way, that is. I've tried the universal driver and that did nothing but gave me a little false hope towards the end.

I've cleared all jobs on the server.... wait, why haven't I deleted the spool folder? Lemme go try that.

[few mins later]

Nope. Nada. It didn't do a thing.

[Chuckster]

I'm kind of getting somewhere with this. From a workstation I went into the properties of the printer and I was able to do a test print. However, printing from anything else, i.e. different apps, and you're poop out of luck.

Well, I'm part way there but still got nothing to try.

[dhicks]

From a workstation I went into the properties of the printer and I was able to do a test print.

We had a 2600 that did that - you could print a test page from the in-built web server control page, but nothing much else. We got rid of the printer in the end - the caretaker had it for home, and we got a new printer to replace it. The caretaker uses it via a USB connection, so probably the printer will print via USB still - you could always attach a mini USB print server, or even a spare workstation if you have one.

--
David Hicks

[Chuckster]

I think you're right, dhicks, I may just have to get rid of them - cut our losses and get some new ones in.

I even went far as getting a working NIC from another printer, and putting it into a printer that's faulty, and that simply did not work. I suspect the NIC isn't the issue and something else is, otherwise the NIC wouldn't have been pingable in the first place. What's more, I'm now unable to print out a test page!

I will try setting up one printer as a USB workstation and see how that pans out for me.

[dhicks]

I suspect the NIC isn't the issue and something else is

You could maybe try updating / re-installing the printer's firmware when you have it plugged in via USB to a workstation - if the network card is okay, maybe it's the firmware?

--
David Hicks

[Chuckster]

I've updated the firmware and it made no difference whatsoever. I'm gonna give the USB a try and, since you mention it, update the firmware that way. I'm not holding my breath, but I am clutching at straws and will give anything a try.

[mac_shinobi]

Not familiar with these printers so not sure if you can take the network card out and on the network card does it have a small button you can press to restore the network card to factory defaults - if not then there might be a method or way to get into the service mode of the printer to wipe the memory off of the network card and then once this has been done and the printer restarted as in powered off for 5 seconds and back on you can re program all the network settings ( ip address, subnet mask, default gateway, dns servers etc )

I would un share the printer on the print server, delete the printer, delete the drivers you are using

( file --> server properties --> driver tab --> select and remove as required )

If it states still in use then restart print spooler and try again - if still the same you may need to reboot the server first then remove the drivers and reboot again to ensure unregistration of drivers

( find the latest version(s) of the same drivers for relevant models of hp printers for both the server OS and the client OS'es from hp's website and save them into a location ie folder on desktop )

Once all removed then re add printers using latest printer drivers ( which are saved in the above folder ), re share them as you have done de selecting bi directional communication, on the port configuration de select the SNMP tick box and try both raw and LPR ports with relevant que name for LPR port generally this is PRINT in uppercase but you will need to check documentation reference the LPR que name.

When re sharing printer(s) ensure that you are adding the client version of the driver under the share tab using the additional drivers button then push them back out to the clients and try again.

If its still the same then just as a test de select advanced printing features under the advanced tab and apply and try again

Im out of ideas if none of the above works as you have already updated firmware and other bits and pieces - you updated the server using a new service pack ie SP 2 or 3 or anything like that which may cause issues ? RTFM on the update read me

[witch]

What is getting me is that everything seems to send stuff to the printers fine, it just doesnt get there - which would imply that it is the nic (which you have pretty much ruled out) or the IP address. Sorry to go on, but how have you checked the IP? Are you SURE the ports are correct?
It's just that I had a similar problem and the IPs looked fine - I reinstalled anyway but it was only when I went right back and changed everything (rather than stick to the same IP) created new ports etc that the printer started working again

[Chuckster]

Not familiar with these printers so not sure if you can take the network card out and on the network card does it have a small button you can press to restore the network card to factory defaults - if not then there might be a method or way to get into the service mode of the printer to wipe the memory off of the network card and then once this has been done and the printer restarted as in powered off for 5 seconds and back on you can re program all the network settings ( ip address, subnet mask, default gateway, dns servers etc )

I would un share the printer on the print server, delete the printer, delete the drivers you are using

( file --> server properties --> driver tab --> select and remove as required )

If it states still in use then restart print spooler and try again - if still the same you may need to reboot the server first then remove the drivers and reboot again to ensure unregistration of drivers

( find the latest version(s) of the same drivers for relevant models of hp printers for both the server OS and the client OS'es from hp's website and save them into a location ie folder on desktop )

Once all removed then re add printers using latest printer drivers ( which are saved in the above folder ), re share them as you have done de selecting bi directional communication, on the port configuration de select the SNMP tick box and try both raw and LPR ports with relevant que name for LPR port generally this is PRINT in uppercase but you will need to check documentation reference the LPR que name.

When re sharing printer(s) ensure that you are adding the client version of the driver under the share tab using the additional drivers button then push them back out to the clients and try again.

If its still the same then just as a test de select advanced printing features under the advanced tab and apply and try again

Im out of ideas if none of the above works as you have already updated firmware and other bits and pieces - you updated the server using a new service pack ie SP 2 or 3 or anything like that which may cause issues ? RTFM on the update read me

When I get into work tomorrow I will be sure to give this a try, although I believe I have done something similar but a fresh look at it from a different pair of eyes could nip this in the bud.

What is getting me is that everything seems to send stuff to the printers fine, it just doesnt get there - which would imply that it is the nic (which you have pretty much ruled out) or the IP address. Sorry to go on, but how have you checked the IP? Are you SURE the ports are correct?
It's just that I had a similar problem and the IPs looked fine - I reinstalled anyway but it was only when I went right back and changed everything (rather than stick to the same IP) created new ports etc that the printer started working again

I've checked the IP simply by pinging it through command prompt. I've also launched the webpage console through the web browser and all appeared normal. The port number on these is 9100. Is this the same for you, too?

I'm gonna reinstall and see where it gets me. Perhaps I've missed something today that I will catch tomorrow. Who knows, only time will tell.