Disappearing Printers

[Garacesh]

This (GPP) is what I am using and the printers are disappearing, this is only happening on my new Windows 10 deployment, not any windows 7 clients. I am thinking either driver or gpo as the old gpos for Windows 7 are wmi only to Windows 7 so maybe I missed something on the new Windows 10 gpos I made.

 

We're still using the Computer Configuration/Policies/Windows Settings/Printer Connections method here* and we're getting it too.

* For most of our printers, because they're deployed by location, Science MFD, English MFD etc. The biiiig printers in Reprographics all staff get, and that's a User Configuration/Policies/Windows Settings/Printer Connections policy.

 

Definitely seems to be a Windows 10 issue.

Edited December 19, 2017 by Garacesh

[Sheridan]

We've had issues with printers since 1607 - deployed as a GPO machine preference and they can appear on half the room, but not the other half, we don't seem to have a consistent pattern.

 

In many cases the printer doesn't appear in Devices and Printers, yet appear in the printer list in Word which is odd.

[Gdog]

Exactly same problem, After days of trial and error only fix/bodge we found was to silently run a GPO update once they logged on which pulls them down every time. Its definitely a windows 10 problem, win 8/7 worked fine.

[Sheridan]

Exactly same problem, After days of trial and error only fix/bodge we found was to silently run a GPO update once they logged on which pulls them down every time. Its definitely a windows 10 problem, win 8/7 worked fine.

 

Windows 7 was extremely stable for us deploying printers - rarely we had a driver issue but nothing like the problems with have with 10.

[Garacesh]

Another one happening here, member of staff had mucked up her profile so I cleared it off, her new one has the printer errors.

Her local printer appears unaffected, but her network printers have vanished.

 

I've taken this opportunity to try deploying a printer via Computer Configuration/Preferences/Control Panel Settings/Printers rather than Computer Configuration/Policies/Windows Settings/Printer Connections, but that hasn't worked either.

[Garacesh]

Given how the issue manifests, it seems to me like something in the building blocks of a local profile gets itself into a permanently b0rked state, so any new profiles that are built from that point use the broken settings and don't get printers. But all ones built before the break appear to work fine. So in the case of the member of staff I mentioned earlier, removing her profile resulted in her having a new one generated, she's been hit with the issue.

 

But it might be worth adding that this doesn't happen for our kids. Our pupil machines have delprof2 running on startup, so they're constantly generating new profiles. Difference being, they use a mandatory profile.

 

I may have to build a mandatory profile for staff and see how that fares..

[FN-GM]

Given how the issue manifests, it seems to me like something in the building blocks of a local profile gets itself into a permanently b0rked state, so any new profiles that are built from that point use the broken settings and don't get printers. But all ones built before the break appear to work fine. So in the case of the member of staff I mentioned earlier, removing her profile resulted in her having a new one generated, she's been hit with the issue.

 

But it might be worth adding that this doesn't happen for our kids. Our pupil machines have delprof2 running on startup, so they're constantly generating new profiles. Difference being, they use a mandatory profile.

 

I may have to build a mandatory profile for staff and see how that fares..

 

I don't think we have the same issue. Ours only happens when you haven't got a user profile on the machine. If you do then it works ok.

[Garacesh]

I don't think we have the same issue. Ours only happens when you haven't got a user profile on the machine. If you do then it works ok.

 

Sounds like the same issue to me. It worked for her until I cleared her profile off the machine (for unrelated reasons) yesterday. Then she logs in (Windows creates a new profile) and it's all gone to pot.

 

This seems to be the case on all the machines that get this issue - anyone who already has a profile gets printers. Everyone who doesn't gets none. And once it's broken (i.e. someone logs in and realises they got no printers) all subsequent new logons/profiles don't get them either, such as when I log in with test accounts.

 

My point being that the pupil devices constantly 'don't have profiles' since we have delprof2 running on them, but seemingly aren't effected by this bug. Perhaps the mandatory profile is helping somehow?

Edited December 20, 2017 by Garacesh

[FN-GM]

Sounds like the same issue to me. It worked for her until I cleared her profile off the machine (for unrelated reasons) yesterday. Then she logs in (Windows creates a new profile) and it's all gone to pot.

 

This seems to be the case on all the machines that get this issue - anyone who already has a profile gets printers. Everyone who doesn't gets none. And once it's broken (i.e. someone logs in and realises they got no printers) all subsequent new logons/profiles don't get them either, such as when I log in with test accounts.

 

My point being that the pupil devices constantly 'don't have profiles' since we have delprof2 running on them, but seemingly aren't effected by this bug. Perhaps the mandatory profile is helping somehow?

 

Sorry I miss understood I think

[HereIGoAgain2601]

We were having what I believe was the same issue. First login and local profile creation printer wouldn’t be there or wouldn’t be set correctly as default. Second login everything fine.. in the end we had to make some registry edits to the user profile printer connections. Can’t remember where I read it now but seems to have solved all our problems will share tomorrow when in the office in case it helps

[forkies]

We were having what I believe was the same issue. First login and local profile creation printer wouldn’t be there or wouldn’t be set correctly as default. Second login everything fine.. in the end we had to make some registry edits to the user profile printer connections. Can’t remember where I read it now but seems to have solved all our problems will share tomorrow when in the office in case it helps

 

Yes please do, sounds like the exact same issue I am having so anything you can shed light on would be of help.

[HereIGoAgain2601]

Hello

 

We had to make these registry keys per printer and item level target to the relevant machines. Not sure if this will help you but worth a shot, sure I found it on here somewhere. The process was to manually add all the printers to a workstation and then use the registry import tool for these keys. I was skeptical at first but since doing this we have had no tickets on our helpdesk! Good luck

 

[Garacesh]

Hello

 

We had to make these registry keys per printer and item level target to the relevant machines. Not sure if this will help you but worth a shot, sure I found it on here somewhere. The process was to manually add all the printers to a workstation and then use the registry import tool for these keys. I was skeptical at first but since doing this we have had no tickets on our helpdesk! Good luck

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]46840[/ATTACH]

 

Can you elaborate on that? Is there a sequence of instructions you followed that you can point me at?

This issue seems to be getting worse and worse here :/

[mrbios]

I'm still seeing this problem. Students on mandatory profiles, staff on local, both get the issue. Windows 10 build 1607, 1703 and 1709.

 

Interesting that you say it's on profile creation @FN-GM I'd not thought of that before. We previously had an issue where printers could be there when logging on, then they would disappear at some point during that logon session, however i think i fixed that one.

 

When it happens to you lot, if you have the printer set to be available in the directory, do you find that the printer that should be there, isn't displayed in the directory? For example i've got T8, T9 T6. If i login to room T6 and the printer isn't there, I'l see T9 and T8 in the directory but not T6. I can then type the path to it manually such as \\printserver\T6 and it'll map fine.

Edited January 11, 2018 by mrbios

[mrbios]

Has anyone had any success doing this with printer scripts? using this:

rundll32.exe printui.dll PrintUIEntry /q /in /n "\\Printserver\printername"

 

With a spooler restart straight afterwards?

 

I'm tempted to give that a test.

 

EDIT: Finally managed to get a PC to reproduce the problem, tried the above, didn't work

 

Tried running the above script but with /dn to delete the printer that should be mapped. Appeared to remove it. Then ran the above script again to add it, went through the motions but still doesn't actually appear in the printers window. Interesting, so the printer is actually added and connected somewhat correctly. However it's not displaying.

 

Possible solution:

rundll32 printui.dll PrintUIEntry /ga /n\\printserver\printername Gw /q /y

 

I've tried all sorts to get the printer to appear. As soon as i ran that, it worked! EDIT: Oh that's adding a per machine connection, so per machine works, per user doesn't.

Edited January 11, 2018 by mrbios

[Sheridan]

I think deployed printers is a non starter in W10 now - we've had just about every PC fail to pick up deployed printers now (Machine GPP deployed)

 

They appear on boot, disappear for some users - delete all their profiles and it may or may not appear for the next user, or perhaps the next one after that.

 

Looks like we'll have to go backwards to the days of Windows 2000 and write a script to install the drivers and install the printers as local devices. What a farce.

 

Edit: One thing I have noticed is that if you have permissions on the printers on the print server, make sure you have Domain Computers in there as well (basic Print rights) as this has fixed a few issues for us - it only started happening when we rolled out W10

Edited January 12, 2018 by Sheridan

[Scryptor]

My printers started disappearing after the last update

[Patrick]

We haven't deployed windows 10 yet but are about to, is this still happening with no fix from Microsoft? It's a serious and major flaw for us. Can people on 1709 confirm this is happening to them also? Edited January 17, 2018 by Patrick

[mrbios]

We haven't deployed windows 10 yet but are about to, is this still happening with no fix from Microsoft? It's a serious and major flaw for us. Can people on 1709 confirm this is happening to them also?

 

Happens with 1607, 1703 and 1709 for me.

[Garacesh]

Happens with 1607, 1703 and 1709 for me.

 

Confirmed on 1607 LTSB

[Sheridan]

Same here on 1607,1703 and 1709.However with the security permissions set as my post above, and using machine preferences I get the printers more reliably. Having said that users don't see the printers on first login for ages, and more often than not the printer appear in an app (i.e Word) but never appear in the Devices and Printers (or only appear as an unknown device)

 

Along with Updates, Printers and hanging explorer Windows 10 is wasting a lot of my time!

[Liam]

So im getting this now. Any further with this?

 

Thanks

 

Liam

[mrbios]

This has got to the point that we really need someone from Microsoft involved that can actually feedback the issue internally and relay possible solutions. Unfortunately though I've no idea how to go about that in order to get back to the right people?

[Sheridan]

I think MS have given up on their OS in education, they only want to be involved in 1:1 devices and 365.

[FN-GM]

I think I am going to shell out the £200 (or whatever it is) for a Microsoft support ticket. I can't see any other way of getting around it.