Brother Printer stopped working - Printing error

[Mister Birdy]

My HL-5240 worked fine on 9/3. Was away for the weekend - came home and now the printer does not work. Printer status is "Error - printing". Option to connect printer is greyed out. Control panel -> printer is ready. Test page does not print ("error - printing"). If I hit the "go" button on the printer three times, I will get a printed copy of the settings so I know that the printer is able to print (no jams, toner good, etc). If I go to the printer properties and select TROUBLE SHOOT, it comes back and tell me "Trouble shooting couldn't identify the problem". I have an epson printer that prints. So, what happened to my Brother? Any ideas?

 

[Hacb]

hmm... is it a wireless, or wired printer?

 

[Mister Birdy]

Wired. USB. I reinstalled the drivers today. No change. Also note that the option to Connect is greyed out.

 

[Hacb]

ok, couple of things to try, first try something like a thumb drive in the port you are using for the printer, if that works, see if you have another cord and try and connect to the printer with that

 

[Mister Birdy]

I have an epson CX4800 printer, too. Both the epson and the brother are USB. I swapped the USB cables - plugged the one that was working with the epson into the brother. No printing. I then put the USB cable that was plugged into the brother into the epson and it prints fine. That tells me that the ports in my PC and the cables are both fine. The problem is in the printer. Oh - and today my epson tanked....I actually heard a bang and now the printer heads jammed. All the lights now flashing and the copy count window is flashing a big "E" for error. Can't scan either - scanner tells me there is no document to scan. So, I'm not having a good day. I planned on junking the epson when the ink cartridges ran out because two of the jets are plugged but really didn't feel like replacing either one of my printers this week. UGH! So, now I really, really would love to salvage this brother if someone can tell me how......