Shared Network Printers Failing - TOUGH ONE

[ws_avd]

The scenario is this:

 

• Local printer shared on PC1 as PRINTER
  
• Added to print server as local port \\PC1\PRINTER
  
• Shared on print server as CLASSX and listed in directory
  
• Assigned to other PCs in class as CLASSX
  
• This has worked for us for a long time. It's how we share our many local printers (we are a special school so local printers are great for the kids).
  

 

Recently this stopped working. The print server can send jobs and they print fine. As can any PC that connects directly to \\PC1\PRINTER. However any job that goes to CLASSX and so via the proxy share on the print server, fails.So my questions are:Has anyone come across this before and have any ideas where to look?Can anyone offer a better way to share local printers across the network?

Some more details below...

Edited November 6, 2017 by ws_avd

[ws_avd]

The printers are Brother DCP-J132W inkjet printers. That up till recently worked fine. The drivers I have are showing as false for packaged! They are 2013 drivers and I think the newest I can obtain.

 

My gut says this all started because we introduced windows Server 2012 as the DC, whereas previously (when it was working fine) they were Server 2008. So it's possibly down to some sort of Group Policy update that has maybe added some new restriction or is implementing a setting we have differently. Figuring that out though will be tricky though.

[ws_avd]

So there are two print servers PS1 and PS2. The following scenario explains what is occurring:

\\PS1\ORANGE - NOT working

\\PS2\ORANGE - NOT working

\\PS1\APPLE - Working!!

\\PS2\APPLE - NOT working

PS1 is our original print server and is server 2003 and APPLE has been on it set up on it for years.

PS2 is a new server 2012 R2 VM

ORANGE stopped working suddenly on PS1 and has since been deleted and recreated many times.

APPLE has been added to PS2 for testing and fails just like ORANGE

We still have several printers on PS1 like APPLE that continue to work!

The thing that is totally wrecking me here is that APPLE is failing on PS2! Which suggests that there could be an issue with PS2 somehow. But then ORANGE is still failing on PS1, which suggest an issue with PS1 aswell. But then why does APPLE continue to work fine on PS1?

[ws_avd]

I'm pretty sure the issue is with either the PC attempting to print or the print server as in failure situations nothing ever hits the PC hosting the printer. Event logs do show messages on one of the print servers though (the 2012 R2). We get the following message, which could be the reason for failure on that print server.The print job 25 was sent through the print processor winprint on printer TURTLES, driver Brother DCP-J132W Printer, in the isolation mode 0 (0 - loaded in the spooler, 1 - loaded in shared sandbox, 2 - loaded in isolated sandbox). Win32 error code returned by the print processor: 0x3F.

 

Googled it and tried a few things but no joy.

 

Any ideas?

[ws_avd]

I've still not fixed this one.

But I've narrowed it down to having something to do with the communication with the PC hosting the printer. Looking in system32\spool\PRINTERS on the server, the spool files from a print sent from a client PC do appear. Then a message appears on the client PC that printing failed.

As I mentioned, we have about 10 printers shared this way and only ONE still works as it used to. I've been using the working example to compare to the failing printers and can see no difference whatsoever in terms of configuration on either the print server or the hosting PC. I am at a real loss.

It feels like, for some reason the final step of sending the spooled documents from the server to the hosting PC is failing. I am sure of this because if watch the host PC PRINTERS folder on the one working PC/PRINTER spool files appear when sending from a client PC. However watching the PRINTERS folder on a failing PC/PRINTER, no spool files appear.

So the flow seems to be like this:

Working: SEND JOB >> Local Spool >> Server Spool >> Host Spool >> PRINT

Failing: SEND JOB >> Local Spool >> Server Spool --| Failure |

Which suggests some sort of permissions thing. I thought about hardening. However it appears that since the particular print server is still 2003 the required reg key is not present.

I have also set the hosting PCs PRINTERS folder to pretty wide access with Users and Everyone with full write access.

But what other permissions could I change?

Any help is much appreciated.

[ws_avd]

So, it's been fun here on my own...

Still, I'm going to report that I have resolved my issues by using direct assignment. I gave up on the UNC path based local printer sharing in the end. It seems that in Server 2012 (probably Server 2008 onwards) this just isn't the way to do it anymore.

To clarify (and for anyone else with the same problem), the final set up I now have is as follows:

TCP/IP printers connected directly to the 2012R2 Print Server and shared using print management's "Deploy with Group Policy..." option.

Locally shared printers (those connected via USB to a client PC) are now shared using the following steps:

 

1. On the Print Server, in Print Management, add the hosting PC as a Print Server.
   
2. Using the hosts print server node on the actual Print Server, configure the USB printer remotely.
   
3. Set it as shared, name it and list it in the directory.
   
4. Use "Deploy with Group Policy..." option to assign to a GPO dedicated to that printer, using the "per machine option".
   
5. Assign the printer's GPO wherever I want the printer to be available.
   

This then allows me to see all local printers via the Print Server, yet they are all deployed with direct connections to the hosting PCs. Seems to work nicely.