Printers May Produce Garbled Output After a Print Job Is Deleted

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This article was previously published under Q160861

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SYMPTOMS

Printers such as the Epson ESC/P models or Hewlett Packard (HP) DeskJet printers may produce garbled output on jobs printed after a print job that was canceled.

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At the beginning of each print job, a Reset Printer command is sent with the number of bytes of data that will be sent. If the job is canceled before all the data is received by the printer, the printer will interpret the subsequent printer jobs as data instead of printer commands, and will not reset the printer.

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RESOLUTION

Turn the printer off and then back on to clear the printers buffer.

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STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Windows NT versions 3.1, 3.50, 3.51, and 4.0. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.

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