Solved Devices and Printers only showing physical printers

[SlimXero]

As the title says, I have a user's machine here that is displaying some weird behavior. There are multiple printer driver's installed, but only a single HP printer is showing up in Devices and Printers. Printmanagement.msc shows a single printer, but 5 drivers (including PDF, OneNote, etc.). No amount of reinstalling and uninstalling has done a lick of good. I've gone through and uninstalled all the bloat that comes with the multiple printers he had installed in the past, no dice. I've checked the registry (HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Devices and PrinterPorts) and everything appears normal. I've reset the spooler, stopped it, cleared the windows\system32\spool\Printers, restarted, nothing. I've gone through everything I can think of. I really, REALLY don't want to format this machine over a printer issue (especially a virtual printer), but I'm getting to the point where the time i've spent on the task is outweighing the time it would've taken to reimage.

If anyone can point me in the right direction, I'd sincerely appreciate it.

 

[Baddog22556]

This may be of interest:
Windows 7: Where are my printers?

Hope it helps.

 

[SlimXero]

This may be of interest:
Windows 7: Where are my printers?

Hope it helps.

Thanks for the response. I tried that and rebooted, same situation. It only shows the 1 physical printer.

 

[Baddog22556]

How many physical printers do you want or are trying to see?

 

[SlimXero]

There is only 1 physical printer, which displays just fine. I don't know if it works, as the user is remote (I'm in Florida, he's in Texas) and he shipped me his laptop as another tech was unable to repair it remotely. It's the "Send to OneNote 2010", "Microsoft XPS Document Writer", "PDF-Exchange Printer 2012", etc. that are missing. They don't show up in the print dialogue boxes for the programs either (I saw a few cases where they wouldn't show up in Devices and Printers but could still be utilized in the dialogue boxes of the programs).

 

[whs]

The 'sendto' menu you can fix if you type "shell:sendto" into Start/Search and hit Enter. You will get the sendto folder where you can add additional shortcuts.

 

[Baddog22556]

I guess add a device or add a printer in Devices and Printers screen changes nothing?
Seems if drivers are installed correctly those devices would show physically connected or not.
Something glitched in that area. Tried any of the older System Restore points?
No, I won't say it. (already said it 3 times in my sig at bottom) :banghead:

 

[SlimXero]

Not sure what you're getting at with the sendto info.

Baddog22556: Correct, Add Printer does nothing. I was hoping to avoid that if at all possible, but it seems like I don't have a choice in the matter as time is running out. Thanks for the help and sorry for the long delay in response, Holidays.

 

[torchwood]

printer

Hi Slim,
in regard to the XPS printer if its not there somebody has removed it, its there by default.

It might be usefull if you check the settings for XPS
see screenshot

Roy

 

[SlimXero]

Attached are screen shots of all relevant screens. XPS is installed.

 

[torchwood]

just want to comfirm,
If you Right click the printer in devices, does it give you a submenu of the "lost" ones.

Roy

 

[SlimXero]

Negative. I saw that and tried it, but no dice.

 

[torchwood]

Also saw tweaking on your screenshot, would have thought its more directed towards home users.
Have a look in its log, see what its changed.

looking around the net other suggestions include checking that print spooler is set to auto, and that sometimes Bluetooth causes problems.
Roy

 

[SlimXero]

Print spooler is set to auto, bluetooth settings are correct per the several different websites that dictate the settings for bluetooth services to be specially configured. Tweaking was used to attempt to repair the print spooler.

Thanks for the help guys, due to time constraints i'm forced to reimage the machine. I appreciate everyone's help!