HP P1100 Photosmart disconnecting / uninstalling by itself

[robert.mcbride@raytheon.com]

I have an HP P1100 connected to an HP a450n via a printer cable using
LPT1. I sucessfully used the HP printer on a 500 MHz P3 PC running
Windows XP for several years without a problem. I upgraded to the new
HP PC a couple of months ago and everything seemed fine, but now, all
of a sudden, I often get a pop-up dialog box stating the printer is
disconnected. The form gives me the option of trying to reconnect or
canceling. In both cased the printer driver is uninstalled. Then the
PC states that it's found 'new hardware' (my HP P1100 Photosmart
printer) and that it can't find the right drivers. So I have to
disconnect the printer and reinstall the HP software again. Then the
printer will work for a day or two until the drivers uninstall
themselves again.

My wife recently installed MSN V6.2 and I recently installed MathCAD
V12.
I run Norton antivirus daily and often run Ad-Aware and Spybot S&D and
they run clean.

Why does my print driver uninstall itself?

~Bob M.

[Cari \(MS-MVP\)]

Possibly a bad cable or bad (failing) LPT port.
--
Cari (MS-MVP) Windows Client - Printing/Imaging and Hardware
www.coribright.com

> wrote in message
ups.com...
>I have an HP P1100 connected to an HP a450n via a printer cable using
> LPT1. I sucessfully used the HP printer on a 500 MHz P3 PC running
> Windows XP for several years without a problem. I upgraded to the new
> HP PC a couple of months ago and everything seemed fine, but now, all
> of a sudden, I often get a pop-up dialog box stating the printer is
> disconnected. The form gives me the option of trying to reconnect or
> canceling. In both cased the printer driver is uninstalled. Then the
> PC states that it's found 'new hardware' (my HP P1100 Photosmart
> printer) and that it can't find the right drivers. So I have to
> disconnect the printer and reinstall the HP software again. Then the
> printer will work for a day or two until the drivers uninstall
> themselves again.
>
> My wife recently installed MSN V6.2 and I recently installed MathCAD
> V12.
> I run Norton antivirus daily and often run Ad-Aware and Spybot S&D and
> they run clean.
>
> Why does my print driver uninstall itself?
>
> ~Bob M.
>
>

[Bob]

I don't think it's the cable. I switched to USB and it does the same
thing. I think it's the printer. At least with USB I can disconnect
the printer, and then when I plug it back in the computer recognizes
it, and I can print.

Aside: I was thinking it was the BIOS setting of the parallel port
(bi-direct, EPP or ECP) but it was set to ECP which I think is correct.

So I downloaded the latest HP software and it installs fine. And I can
print a couple of documents okay, but then it disconnects. It might
disconnect right after printing.... I'll experiment.

Thanks
Bob M.

[Bob]

I finally have a working printer again.

I recently upgraded from a 500 MHz P3 PC with a refurbished 2.8 GHz HP
Pavilion PC last November. The printer worked fine for awhile, but then
started this problem with disconnecting. My orginal message said that
the only real change to the PC was the installation of MSN 6.2 and
MathCAD v8.

The printer works fine with both my USB and parallel cable with my
daughter's Dell PC running Windows 98, so I know the printer and cables
are fine.

I tried getting help from HP, and while they tried to help, I never
really got the printer working. To be fair I had two trouble tickets
open simultaniously and they helped with the other one.

So the other night I decided to examine what's installed on the
computer. I noticed there where lot's of installed software and games
that I've never even heard of. Out they go! I even came across a
bunch of HP Photosmart software that was unrelated to my driver. Out
they go! I probably removed a dozen or more apps and games, but the
printer didn't work.

I noticed when I install the driver the MSN app pops up a GUI
suggesting to upgrade. So I figure there's some conflict between the
printer driver and the MSN software. Out it goes!

Without the MSN software the printer is back up and running, or at
least it was last night, and I even have a couple of printouts to prove
it.

~Bob