Printer Error after Windows 7 Install

I installed Windows 7 on my laptop a few days ago, and i just tnow tried to print a document. I hooked the printer up, waited for the driver to install, and when i tired to print this document i got an error message:

"Communication not available

The printer cannot communicate with the computer.

Please turn on "Enable Bidirectional Communication" setting in the printer properties dialog."

My laptop is a Acer 4620-4605
The printer is a Lexmark X4550

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

This did not seem to work for me. I uninstalled and reinstalled the printer and printer driver, and no cigar.

After 3 days of frustration and searching without much luck I finally figured out a way to possibly fix a problem such as yours. I have a Lexmark X4850 that I've owned for awhile, but the last time it ran out of ink I just got a cheap HP to print but I kept the Lexmark to scan documents with. This week I finally found a great deal on ink for the Lexmark and got some, but until now I hadn't tried to print using the Lexmark on my new Windows 7 install (it was used to print on a Windows XP machine before), as I only used it to scan documents. After inserting the ink and trying to print a test page I received the same error you got complaining about "enable bidirectional communication". I tried messing around in the software that came with the drivers and found it could print the alignment and cleaning pages fine, but trying to print a test page or any other document I would get the "enable bidirectional communication" error and the option to enable it was greyed out. After trying every driver and suggestion I could find (ranging from running the setup in Windows compatibility mode to deleting all references of Lexmark in the registry) I finally did this to get it to work by doing these steps.

1) Unplug the printer from the computer (USB, ect...)

2) Uninstall any installed Lexmark printing software in the Control Panel's Add/Remove Programs

3) Go into Control Panel-Device's & Printers and remove the Lexmark printer from here (right-click Remove Device)

4) Download the recommended drivers for your printer and OS from Lexmark's site http://support.lexmark.com

5) Extract the drivers (I left the default C:\Lexmark\drivers\...) but if the setup program starts automatically close it, all we want it to do is extract the drivers for now

6) Plug your printer into your computer and open the window that shows the drivers that it is installing and click the link stating do not download drivers for this device through Windows update

7) Once it gets done hopefully it didn't automatically install the printer drivers, right-click on Computer and select Manage, than select Device Manager

8) You should be able to find your printer located here and have some sort of marking next to one or two icons showing that it doesn't function properly. Right-click on these items and choose update driver

9) In the window that this brings up choose to browse for the drivers locally and select the folder that the drivers you downloaded were extracted to (ex. C:\Lexmark) and make sure that the include sub-folders is checked. Do this for each of the Lexmarks printer icons for your printer in the Device Manager (I did get a timed out message when I tried installing it on one of the two Lexmark devices that showed for me, but I installed the drivers for the other one than went back and tried the one that timed out and it installed fine the second time)

This should have installed your printer, you can check in Control Panel-Devices & Printers. If it's there you can also go to it's properties and check the Ports tab to see if "enable bidirectional communication" is checked, if it is you're sitting good thus far. However now when I tried to print a test page I got an "0x00000002" error...son of a.......but.....

10) Go to the folder where you extracted the drivers to and run the Setup.exe file and go through it as normal (I left everything pretty much default).

11) Hopefully if you were like me step 10 fixed the 0x00000002 error and bidirectional communication is still enabled from the earlier steps and now you can print.

It was a pain, but I'm happy to finally be able to print again with my Lexmark X4850. I know some steps may be a bit confusing the way I explained, but hopefully this may help someone else.

cs1988 said:

I installed Windows 7 on my laptop a few days ago, and i just tnow tried to print a document. I hooked the printer up, waited for the driver to install, and when i tired to print this document i got an error message:

"Communication not available

The printer cannot communicate with the computer.

Please turn on "Enable Bidirectional Communication" setting in the printer properties dialog."

My laptop is a Acer 4620-4605
The printer is a Lexmark X4550

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

After many hours, I fixed this problem by simply going to my printer's properties, go to Ports, in my case it was USB, click box enabling Bidirectional Communications. That fixed me up and able to print on my Lexmark Z2350 Printer/Scanner.