dell 922 printer problem

[NavinS]

Hello

I am having dell 922 printer problem. I updated to vista & had problems with the dell aio 922. The computer says it recognizes the printer & that it's ready to go but when i try & print i get the "nocommunication" message.

Can someone help me ?

Thanks

[nitesh mehta]

Have you turned off your firewalls & download the update for the printer to vista.

[Expertz]

When upgrading the OS sometimes the older drivers and software can cause problems like this. The best way to get it working again is to completely remove all traces of the printer and reinstall. Simply deleting the drivers may not be enough so here is a complete rundown for removing all of the printer drivers and printer software from the system.


First, Disconnect the USB cable from the computer.

Second, we need to stop the printer spooler service as follows:
1) Click Start.
2) Type ‘cmd’ in the Start Search box.
---Search results should appear---
3) Right‐click on ‘cmd’ in the search results, and then select Run as Administrator.
---The command window will appear---
4) Type ‘net stop spooler’ into the command window and press <ENTER>.
---The Print Spooler service should now be stopped---

Next, we’re going to delete the printer drivers from the system as follows:

---Warning--- These steps will remove drivers for ALL printers installed on the system.

1) Click Start.
2) In the Start Search box, type ‘C:\Windows\System32\Spool\Drivers\w32x86’ and press
<ENTER>.
3) Delete all the files and folders in this directory.
---NOTE--- There may be some files that will not delete because they are being used by Windows.
Click on the Ignore button to bypass deleting these files.

With the drivers uninstalled we now have to remove the Dell printer software.

1) Click Start.
2) Click Control Panel.
3) Click Programs.
4) Click Programs and Features.
5) Click the software related to the attached Dell printer to highlight it.
6) Click Uninstall/Change.
7) Follow through the prompts in order to remove the software.

Now we need to delete the Dell printer from the printers list.

1) Click Start
2) In the search bar type “Printers” and press <Enter>
3) Select any and all Dell printers and press <Delete>

Now delete any OLD drivers from the Server Properties Window.

1) Click Start
2) Type Printers into the search bar and press <Enter>
3) Press <ALT> to bring up the file menu.
4) Select Run As Administrator then Server Properties.
5) if the UAC window appears just click Continue.
6) Click on the Drivers tab.
7) Select any Dell printer drivers listed.
8) Click Remove, and then select Remove Driver and Driver Package.
9) Select Yes to confirm removal of the driver.
10) The system will now scan to see if it can remove the driver.
11) Once it has finished scanning click on Delete.

---Repeat the last 11 steps for each Dell printer driver that is installed.
At this point, you should be able to install the latest printer software for Vista from http://support.dell.com and be able to print successfully.
---NOTE--- It’s been reported that some driver installations in Vista can take up to 10 minutes. Be patient and please wait for the driver to fully install.

[cnrogers]

I was printing just fine on my home network with one computer running Vista and the Dell 922 connected to another a computer running XP. My mistake was trying to switch this arrangement around. After multiple install and uninstall attempts there appears to be nothing that I can do to get my Vista machine to print even though all drivers appear to have installed correctly.

Based on the excellent instructions from this thread I have successfully:
1. Disconnected the printer from the USB port
2. Stopped the print spooler using the “net stop spooler” command
3. Deleted all files and folders from C:\Windows\System32\Spool\Drivers\w32x86 directly from the command prompt
4. Restarted the print spooler using the “net start spooler” command
5. Uninstalled any remaining Dell printer programs from Programs and Features
6. Confirmed that there were no Dell printer in the printer list
7. Attempted to remove Driver and Driver Package from control panel’s Printers –File –Run as Administrator –Server Properties –Drivers – Remove
8. Reinstalled Dell 922 Vista drivers from Dell’s website

My problem appears to be in step 7. When I try to remove the Driver and Driver Package I get the following message:

Failed to remove driver Dell Photo AIO Printer 922. The specified printer driver is currently in use. Failed to remove package dlbtprc.inf.

The Dell 922 still shows up Print Server Properties – Drivers list. The new drivers do not install properly because Vista still thinks the previous driver is in use.

Any suggestions?

[T.J.]

I am listing you a solution to make your printer work. Right click on My Computer > Properties > Hardware > Device Manager. Then go to Image Devices or Scanner. Right click on it and select uninstall. Then unplug your printer. Now open my computer and press Ctrl + F from the keyboard to launch a search process. Search for twain keyword. Delete everything you find with twain.ds or similar. Restart your computer. Then again go to Device Manager and uninstall USB Root HUB. Again restart. Connect the printer and update the latest drivers.

[cnrogers]

Thanks T.J. for your suggestions

I had already tried deleting the "twain32" files. Uninstalling the USB Root HUBs from device manager was an interesting approach. I discovered that there is one for each of the seven USB ports on my Dell Desktop.

Imagine my surprise when my keyboard and mouse stopped working when I started uninstalling them! Given that my machine only has USB interface for peripheral devices I thought I was in serious trouble when my mouse and keyboard stopped working after unistalling the 3rd USB Root HUB.

A reboot should automatically reinstall the USB port drivers but my mouse and keyboard failed to respond. What a catastrophe!

Turns out after desperately trying several USB ports I could get the keyboard to respond but my mouse wouldn't. Using only the keyboard to navigate I finally figured out that my mouse batteries had died at the time when I really needed them but it took a couple of hours to discover this embarrassing fact!

I’m lucky in that my computer is still under warranty with Dell. It took quite an effort to figure out the dead battery problem with a Dell hardware technician using DellConnect.

Once that issue was resolved I was put through to a Dell printer specialist who clearly understood the printer driver problem. It is much deeper than simply messing about with files in Windows\System32... There were several registry keys that needed to be deleted before attempting to reinstall the printer drivers.

Future readers of TechArena please note: Messing with REGEDIT should NOT be attempted by anyone who is not familiar with this level of troubleshooting!

Dell support can be frustrating but eventually you will get through to someone who knows what they are doing. Thanks Santhosh at Dell for getting to the root of the problem.

No thanks to Dell Corporate for not putting the resources into an online Patch/Update that doesn’t do this automatically.

Hope this post helps future victims of obsolete Dell printers