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You experience Print Spooler error messages after installing or upgrading a Third-Party print driver

Article ID: 2793718 - View products that this article applies to.

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Symptoms

You may experience any of the following symptoms on your Windows-based client computer:

During the install or upgrade of a third-party print driver, you may receive the following error messages:

Operation failed with error 0x00000057
Printer driver was not installed. Operation could not be completed (error 0x00000057)
Operation failed with error 0x000005b3
Operation could not be completed (error 0x00000bc4). No printers were found.
Windows cannot connect to the printer. Operation could not be completed (error 0x00000002)

When you try to start or stop the Print Spooler service, you may receive the following error message:

Spooler subsystem app has encountered a problem and needs to close

When you click Start, and then click Printers and Faxes in Windows XP, or Devices and Printers in Windows Vista or later, you may receive the following error message:

Spooler subsystem app has encountered an error and needs to close

When you click Start, and then click Printers and Faxes in Windows XP, or Devices and Printers in Windows Vista or later to try to view your printers, no printers appear. This issue may occur even if you have printers installed.

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Cause

These issues may occur if a third-party printer driver or service affects the functionality of an existing or newly installed printer.

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Resolution

This Fix it Solution automates resetting the Print Spooler only for Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2 Remote Desktop Servers.

The Fix it has two modes: Light and Full. The light mode will make changes to the spooler that should not require the end user to make any changes. The full mode will restore the print spooler to defaults and require a reinstall of print drivers and printers.

To reset the Print Spooler automatically, click the Fix this problem link. Then click Run in the File Download dialog box, and follow the steps in this wizard.
Full mode:

Fix this problem
Microsoft Fix it 50979

Light mode:

Fix this problem
Microsoft Fix it 50984

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More Information

Notes:

PowerShell 2.0 is required
The Fix it will not run on Windows Server that has the Print Role installed
This wizard may be in English only. However, the automatic fix also works for other language versions of Windows
If you are not on the computer that has the problem, save the Fix it solution to a flash drive or a CD and then run it on the computer that has the problem.
A log is created automatically and saved in %windir%\printreset
The following command line switches are supported

-light Light Mode - Corrects common printing issues
-full Full mode - Resets spooler service and print registry keys to defaults
-force Do not prompt for confirmation
-quiet Do not display console output

For more information about installing print drivers and printer, visit the following Microsoft website:

Update and Manage Printer Drivers

To reset the Print Spooler on legacy operating systems such as Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 2003, and Windows 2008, use Fix It Solution 9662904.

For more information about the legacy Fix It, see blog http://blogs.technet.com/b/askperf/archive/2012/02/24/microsoft-fixit-for-printing.aspx?Redirected=true

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Note This is a "FAST PUBLISH" article created directly from within the Microsoft support organization. The information contained herein is provided as-is in response to emerging issues. As a result of the speed in making it available, the materials may include typographical errors and may be revised at any time without notice. See Terms of Use

(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=151500)

for other considerations.

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