Cant print over network both win 7 computers splwow64 not responding?

Hi everyone

Stumbled across the forum when trying to fix my problem.

I have an issue trying to print over my network. I am not the most technical person but will try hard to provide any information that might help.

I have a laptop running Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit and
A desktop running Windows 7 Pro 32 bit. The printer is connected via usb to the desktop its an Epson sx400 (not wireless)

My error started about a month ago, it began with me having a problem changing the orientation in word 2010 from portrait to landscape kept getting a not responding error. When I googled this someone advised to check resource manager to find out what was causing the error word seemed to be waiting on splwow64.exe. Thought this might be just word so tried open office software same issue. Realised I could not print any longer from laptop to printer over the network as well resource manager spoolsv.exe causing the hang.

I have racked my brains to think of what might have changed a few weeks ago cant think of anything same computers, same printer. Same home group.

Ive tried the following:

Reinstall printer driver on desktop
Remove and readd printer on laptop.
Plugging laptop in to printer directly (which works)

I dunno

Any help welcome with open arms, if you need more info that i didnt think to include please let me know, thanks in advance and thanks for reading

Siobhan

Edited to include further info:

Also windows firewall is off on both machines

From the laptop see if you can view the printer icon in connected devices, if not you may just need to make sure the printer is shared properly on the desktop.