Article ID: 158042 - Last Review: February 26, 2007 - Revision: 2.4

"Operation Could Not Be Completed" When Using Add Printer Wizard

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This article was previously published under Q158042

For a Microsoft Windows XP version of this article, see 314876 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314876/EN-US/ ) .

Notice

This article applies to Windows 2000. Support for Windows 2000 ends on July 13, 2010. The Windows 2000 End-of-Lifecycle Solution Center (http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=http%3a%2f%2fsupport.microsoft.com%2fwin2000) is a starting point for planning your migration strategy from Windows 2000. For more information see the Microsoft Support Lifecycle Policy (http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/) .

SYMPTOMS

When you create a printer (either a local printer or a remote network printer) by using the Add Printer Wizard, you may receive one of the following error messages:

Operation could not be completed. The RPC Server is unavailable.

Operation could not be completed. The remote procedure call failed and did not execute.

Printer operation cannot continue due to lack of resources. The print subsystem is unavailable.

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CAUSE

The error message occurs because the Spooler service has not been started or has stopped working. To start the Spooler service, use the following steps.

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Windows NT 4.0

Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.
Double-click the Services icon.
Double-click the Spooler service, click Startup, and then set the startup type to Automatic. This sets the Spooler service to start automatically when you restart the computer.

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Windows 2000

Click Start, point to Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services.
Double-click the Printer Spooler service, and then change the startup type to Automatic. This sets the Spooler service to start automatically when you restart the computer.

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MORE INFORMATION

You can also start the Spooler service by typing net start spooler in the Run dialog box.

Note that the error message is not resolved even if you start the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Locator and service in the Services tool in Control Panel.

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