Win 8 and 8.1 client showing shared printer server as offline

Hi,

 

we have a problem with our print environment (HP and Ricoh printers).

 

We have some Windows 8 and 8.1 clients and a Windows Server 2008 R2 printserver.

Windows 8 and 8.1 is showing the printers as offline. Its seems the problem described here -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2713128

We already installed the fix on the server but this didn't resolve the issue.

 

Maybe somebody have the same issues and an alternate solution for this?

Best regards
  • Edited by Pictop Wednesday, November 06, 2013 9:24 AM
November 6th, 2013 12:23pm

Hi,

Thanks for posting in the forum.

So far, there's no fix for Windows 8. Since you have tried the hotfix you mentioned without any help, please also try to install this update to see if it could help.

Update rollup: Fix printing problems in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2647753

If the issue persists, please try to refer to the following articles to troubleshoot the issue.

Printer shows as Offline in Windows 8 (Workaround)

http://www.blakepell.com/Blog/?p=611

How to: Fix a network printer suddenly showing as offline in Windows Vista

http://blog.rtwilson.com/how-to-fix-a-network-printer-suddenly-showing-as-offline-in-windows-vista/

As it mentioned in the article above, please try to open the print queue dialog and choose Properties from the Printer menu that it would connect to the printer and bring it back online. Also, maybe disabling SNMP support for network printers will work.

Here are some similar threads as reference, hope they could help.

Network printer shows offline on Windows 8

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-hardware/network-printer-shows-offline-on-windows-8/7851703b-492c-4e97-8063-f1fc2aa63ec0

Network printer still connected, but shows as offline

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_xp-hardware/network-printer-still-connected-but-shows-as/90e0dd64-d4a3-41f2-a361-05947988bdee

Best Regards,

Andy Qi

TechNet Subscriber Support

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November 7th, 2013 1:01pm

Hi Andi,

thanks for the reply. 

the Update 2647753 is already installed but it didn't solve the problem.

We have already tried the workarounds and it solves the problem but only temporary.

I hope we get some update from Microsoft that solves the problem definitely.

 

Best regards

November 12th, 2013 12:33pm

Hi,

Any update?

Just checking in to see if the suggestions were helpful. Please let us know if you would like further assistance.

Best Regards,

Andy Qi

TechNet Subscriber Support

If you are TechNet Subscription user and have any feedback on our support quality, please send your feedback here.

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November 13th, 2013 6:29am

Hi Andy,

 your suggestions were helpful, but the issue is not resolved. The Suggestion solved the issue only temporary.  I hope we get some update from Microsoft that resolves the issue definitely.

Best regards

November 22nd, 2013 1:27pm

The fix for this is quite simple.  Although it took us weeks to figure it out, we have made this change on all machines and the offline problem has not returned.

Open Network and Sharing Center -> Change Advanced Sharing Settings -> Under private, select turn on network discovery and check the box just below it for automatic setup -> Click on Save Changes.

Within seconds, all jobs in the queue will start pri

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February 13th, 2014 10:48pm

We have discovered this issue affecting only Windows 8.1 machines - our Windows 7 machines don't have this problem (identical hardware and same printers).

As a workaround, I've discovered that restarting the print spooler service on the client resolves the issue in the short term.

Interestingly, restarting an affected computer doesn't fix the problem, so I suspect there is something to do with network connectivity when the spooler first starts up - if the spooler can't contact the server when it starts it seems to get into this error state.

I've set the spooler service to delayed startup in Group Policy, which has worked so far (for a small sample of computer). 

But a real fix to the problem is needed...

February 26th, 2014 12:46am

Thanks for this work around.  Someone is looking at this.  You are correct a real fix is needed.
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February 26th, 2014 9:51pm

We have the exactly the same problem with our PC on Windows 8.1 (printer server version is 2008R2).

We have some DELL/KONICA Printers, we have seen that the problem appears for the mobile users only (laptop), when the users travel and return to the office.

Microsoft must investigate on this issue, because business users on Windows 8.1 are annoyed !!!

February 26th, 2014 9:56pm

If anyone has a support contract with MS, call in and create a case. Give them my name and I can point them in the right direction.  If anyone new finds this post please throw in a "me too", there are other people watching this.

Does disabling Network Discovery on Domain networks help on the mobile clients?

thanks

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February 26th, 2014 10:43pm

I just finish to try these parameters on a laptop who encoutered this issue this morning (GMT+1 from France):

disabling/enabling "Network Discovery" and "share file/printers"on Domain networks/private/public/all networks NOTHING change !

I find a strange resolution but i must check if that's resolve definitively this issue in a long time.

I explain it :

Normally, we have installed the printers network on client using a double click on printer server :  \\printerserver(netbios)\nameofprinter or vbscript since a double click on the PC or by GPO.

Today we have used the wizard in bar menu from (control panel\devices and printers) "add printer" the PC open automatically a Windows with all printers network listed in Active Directory.

We added the same printer who appears OFFLINE, but the wizard installed it with domain name like Name of Printer on nameofprinterserver.nameofdomain.local (before we have : Name Of Printer on nameofprinterserver).

And after we have the two printers; one appears Offline and the other appears ONLINE (with domainname) ?!! (we never restart the computer or the spooler services or logout the user session). And this printer works (page test is OK) !!?

We have uninstall the printer appears OFFLINE for resintall it from a double click on printer server :  \\printerserver(netbios)\nameofprinter we obtained an error message... !!

To be continued...

-----------------

I add that's this issue isn't valid, just permit to add the same printer (with dns name) for appears online without reboot or restart the spooler service. After some reboot this new printer appears offline...

February 27th, 2014 12:46pm

I also have an 8.1 client on a 2008 domain, experiencing "offline" printers when coming back to the office. If I restart the print spooler service, that seems to help. The printers are not actually offline, but they are shared from the server, not set up as local printers.
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February 27th, 2014 8:06pm

Anyone find a solution for this problem apparently and this problem affect a lot of users on Windows 8.1.

So i open a case @ Microsoft Support :

Titre de l'incident :Win 8 and 8.1 client showing shared printer server as offline Numro de demande de support :114022811224491 Niveau de svrit : C

Answer Under 8 hours, i inform you for the following...

February 28th, 2014 2:45pm

Can you give me a contact name? I'm not in support so I don't have a way to find you case by the number.

thanks

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February 28th, 2014 8:39pm

I have tried many of the suggestions in this thread and others and nothing seems to deliver a fix.  This just doesn't happen on a domain/AD network.  I have clients that experience it on P2P too.  It seems like one user had a fix and that was disabling the network card and then re-enabling it.  That works for about 2-3 hours and then the printer(s) are unavailable even though they can be reached by IP address.  It would be nice for MS to address this as it seems to be a wide spread issue with 8/8.1.
March 1st, 2014 12:04am

I only have some additional observations to add.

We've just discovered this problem on our network as well.  2 machine types identified so far, Lenovo Thinkpad Yoga and Surface Pro, are experiencing this problem.  The point there is, one of these builds is native 8.1 (no upgrade), and one is an upgrade to 8.1.  We have other machines in deployment stage that also have a native build of 8.1 on them, but they are early in testing so we don't now if we are experiencing this problem with them yet or not.  Our printers are all shared through a 2008 r2 network print server.  Our users are not admins so restarting the print spooler is not an option. 

As an aside, We have verified that rebooting the machine does not fix the issue. This is REALLY disturbing. From what we can tell, if you Uncheck "Turn on Fast Startup" from "Power Options/Chose what the power buttons do", then when you request a reboot, the machine will actually REBOOT. If the "Turn on Fast Startup" is checked, a reboot does not actually fully reboot the system but rather maintains a kernel and driver state of the system and does something of a hybrid reboot.  Are you kidding?  When is a reboot not really a reboot?  When you're using Windows h8...  We have not verified yet whether unchecking "Turn on Fast Startup" will allow a reboot to fix the network printing issue, but I'll update this post when we know the re

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March 1st, 2014 1:28am

We're having exactly the same problem with 160+ new Lenovo X240 machines running Windows 8.1

Very frustrating indeed ...

March 3rd, 2014 6:56am

Hi,

we have the same issuers in our environment. But only the Windows 8.1 Pads have the problem. We connect our printer via http from several destinations and in the most cases it says "RPC-Server not available" We also have win 7 Pads on the same Destination and they working fine.

The only solution that works fine so far is to restart the Spooler, which needed Administration privilegs, wich our users dont have. Thats hmm.. yeah.. -.-

We have 230 Printers.. so yeah its frustrating. If anybody had a solution.... pls tell us. I now set up a new Server Win2012 R2 to test it...

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March 3rd, 2014 12:11pm

Hi, Alan Morris? I'm seriously considering scheduling an admin task to restart the print spooler service on Windows 8 devices. I'm going to experiment on one laptop first, but can you recommend a way to roll this out by group policy, so that when the real solution is presented I can remove it by group policy?
March 4th, 2014 12:21am

That's me.

I'm not sure what the issue would be with Win8.  I do not have much experience with setting up GPOs that do any other than get printer connections or settings out.

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March 4th, 2014 1:44am

Hi all,

I met the similar issue with yours days ago, and I was able to fix the issue by disabling fast Startup option in Windows 8.1.

Please launch Control panel>>Power options>>Choose what the power button does>>Uncheck Turn on fast startup.

Hope this may help.

March 4th, 2014 11:10am

Hi Susie, it's nice to know that I can disable fast startup to work around this problem, but that is a desirable feature. Although I think this may be easier to turn on and off via a GPO.

For now, I'm using a scheduled task to run a batch file to restart the service. To minimize the disruption to the user, I am only running it when the user is logged in, it is triggered upon logon or unlock, and only when the work place network connection is available (so it shouldn't bug them when they are working at home).

I do assume that a "real" solution is forthcoming? I hope?

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March 5th, 2014 12:51am

I have found the same issue as well, sorry I can't contribute anything useful to this discussion, but I would like Microsoft to investigate this issue ASAP as it intermittently affects all 8.1 users in our organisation. How can we escalate this issue?
March 6th, 2014 3:03am

To escalate, you would need to open a support case.  As I stated previously other people are watching this post, it's getting noticed. 

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March 6th, 2014 3:21am

We are having the same issue with some of our Win 8.1 Tablets and Ultrabooks as well. Again, a restart of the Spooler is the only temporary fix we know of, so would really appreciate a permanent fix.

March 6th, 2014 4:43am

We just replaced our laptop fleet with Sony Vaio Pros running Win 8.1.  Staff immediately began having this problem.  They are getting pretty fed up with manually restarting the print spooler every time, for some users they have to do it every day.  Symptoms are as described by other users.  We are trying the registry entry fix as described in http://support.microsoft.com/kb/983035/en-au but without high hopes since at least one person in this thread https://mitie.instructure.com/courses/1/discussion_topics/64 has tried it without success.  (EDIT I just heard from one of the test registry fix users that she rebooted and the printers were all offline when she went to print.  Looks like the registry fix isn't a solution). 

Our previous Dell Latitude E5510s running Windows 7 did not have this problem.  None of our current desktop users (Dell workstations running Win 7) have ever had the problem.

  • Edited by smaunsell Thursday, March 06, 2014 5:04 AM
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March 6th, 2014 7:13am

Hi there,

We have the exact same issue - fully patched up to date drivers in all cases.

Restarting the print spooler works everytime but generally every morning its offline. SNMP disabled on all print q's and Printer driver DB up to date.

8.1 & 8 Windows connecting to W2K8R2

Random users same privileges/group membership.

Cheers

Chris


March 6th, 2014 8:22am

Hello everyone,

we are facing the same issue. Our environment is a print server W2008r2, Dell laptops Latitude E5530 or E6520 with windows 8.1 printing on Ricoh, HP and Lexmark all with their respective universal driver 32 and 64 bits.  

This print server is working for 18 month and we have no problem nor with Windows Xp nor Windows 7.

What we also noticed is that the IT staff remains unaffected by this problem although we were already working with the same environment as soon as Windows 8.1 was available. We have full admin rights.

This is not true for the users who are affected every day by the problem mainly when they come back to work or from a meeting.

In fact the spooler is not stopped but it's not working anymore. Of course we already tried everything discussed hereabove.

Cheers,

MobiSerge

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March 6th, 2014 11:11am

@Alan Morris

We're also experiencing this same issue:

  • Windows 8.1 Clients on AD Domain
  • Windows 2008 R2 Print Server 
  • Printers added via GPO

March 7th, 2014 4:53pm

Hello,

disabling the snmp status on the server (W2008R2) for the 200 printers seems to solve the problem.

 Last week I forgot to change the settings for six printers in another part of the network and some of our users are still impacted. I changed the setting this monday morning (march 10th 2014). 

I'll be back in a few days to tell you more.


  • Edited by MobiSerge Monday, March 10, 2014 9:57 AM
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March 10th, 2014 12:56pm

Thanks.
March 10th, 2014 8:02pm

We are also having the same issue.

We are trialling surface 2 pro's and hoping to roll these out to all of our staff, but this issue is having a negative impact on the trial.

We have a server2008r2 printer server hosting a range of HP printers

We have updated the printer drivers and tried the HP universal driver but the issue remains.

The printer spooler service remains in a running state when the "printer offline" error occurs but a service restart is needed to temporarily resolve the issue.

As mentioned already, a restart does not resolve this, only a spooler service restart is our only temporary fix

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March 11th, 2014 3:30pm

Just want to add us as another company having this issue.  Win 2008 R2 Print server, Surface Pros and Pro 2's all intermittently experience this issue.  I'm running Win 8.1 Enterprise and have not had the issue, but I do not print much and I shutdown my Win 8 VM each night.

In each case restarting the print spooler has fixed the issue for that time for that person.  

Printers are added via a mix of GPO and manual additions. 

Thanks

March 11th, 2014 6:27pm

Ok I'm back as promised.  Forget about removing SNMP status on port, it is not enough.

So I tried to reproduce the issue.  I worked at home yesterday without any connection to a network, this morning (march 12 2014) I logged on as admin after a cold boot. (connected by mean of a network cable as usual in the office).

Printers from two different print servers were offline (6 from main print server and another one from a print server in another location).

When I try to display the printer properties the panel appears but if I try to click on Ports -> Configure port ... I can read the message "An error occured during port configuration.  The server print spooler service is not running.  Please restart the spooler on the server or restart the server machine".

The local spooler displays a "running" status.

At the same time, we were able to print on the same printers from other computers.  I restarted the spooler on the server as instructed, it took  a long time to do so but nothing changed.

Next I started the laptop again from a cold start and all printers are online again :-(

Our users are becoming angry and they don't want to believe us any more.

Cheers,

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March 12th, 2014 1:12pm

i open a case @ Microsoft Support since the 28 february :

synthesis :Titre de l'incident :Win 8 and 8.1 client showing shared printer server as offline
Numro de demande de support :114022811224491Niveau de svrit : C

I'm sorry because the last week i'm in Holiday... And Microsoft informe me that this issue can take more time because isn't a simple problem. I have sent to MS the links of this forum for showed that's all people use Win 8 encoutered this issue and many client and end user are very angry...

So Microsoft asked to me a lot of information (debug Tools, event viewver, capture, on both client/server).

I inform you for the following...

March 12th, 2014 2:46pm

Restarting the Print Spooler service in the CLIENT should get the server state back to an Online status. 

If you were hitting the same issue as others here, disabling SNMP on the network printer port would have no affect.  The printers are never Offline, it's the server state so the connections are Offline.

Thanks for the "Me too" posts here.  Your are inspiring some additional attention to the issue.  Keep them coming.

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March 12th, 2014 9:30pm

Ask the support person you are working with to contact me.   Alan Morris.

Thanks

March 12th, 2014 9:33pm

"Me too": W8.1 on Dell E6220, wired peer home network with ADSL modem/router, Brother MFC885CW 

First offline problem after upping W8 to 8.1 a month ago, no issues under W8.  Restarting various machines fixed it for a while without driver reinstallation.  Printer offline the second time now, haven't had the time to muck around with it yet.

Addition: a cursory Google search reveals how big the problem is.  There is a thread on MS Community http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-hardware/network-printer-shows-offline-on-windows-8/7851703b-492c-4e97-8063-f1fc2aa63ec0, HP has threads on it http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Printer-All-in-One-Install-Setup/Printer-appears-offline-Windows-8/td-p/2397301, etc
  • Edited by csomole Thursday, March 13, 2014 7:52 AM
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March 13th, 2014 10:46am

We are having the same issue. Very frustrating! Need a fix asap.
March 13th, 2014 6:59pm

We're also having the same issues. WS2008 R2 print server, Win 8.1 clients, printers added through GPP.
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March 14th, 2014 11:06am

This seems to be a windows 8/8.1 to server 2008r2 issue. Most people having this issue seem to have the printers on a 2008r2 printer server. I have now mapped the printers directly to a few of my users, bypassing the 2008r2 server and this seems to have resolved the issue.

This isn't a permanent fix, but it would be interesting if anyone is having the same "printer offline" issue with a different OS on their printer server? e.g. 2012/2012r2?

March 14th, 2014 12:38pm

We are running a 2012 R2 print server and having these issues with all our modern devices running 8.1, by modern I mean purchased in the last couple of years. Our server was upgraded from 2008r2 if that makes any difference.

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March 17th, 2014 1:13am

Add another one to the list. We have deployed 105 laptops to staff with Windows 8.1 and are having the offline printer issue regularly which we never previoulsy had on Windows 7 with the same Windows 2012 print server.   

March 17th, 2014 9:37am

Thanks for the information regarding print server target OS.    I would love to understand the networking configuration that exposes this issue but having a solution in place is a bit more important.  This is not an issue we experience in our network configuration on main campus.
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March 18th, 2014 2:53am

We have a similar issue. We have 150+ Windows 8.1 computers. I tried engaging Microsoft for some support but the person on the other end insisted there is no problem with Windows. As a temporary solution I created a runas shortcut to restart spooler services. Once the spooler is restarted all printers are restored back to online. Below is the target I put in the shortcut for runas. I pushed this shortcut and file out via GPO but the problem I have is my techs have to roll out and type in the local admin password once. As someone previously stated, there needs to be a permanent fix!

C:\Windows\system32\runas.exe /user:%computername%\administrator /savecred "C:\restartspooler.bat"

March 18th, 2014 3:52am

  • We have 600+ laptops authenticated with Radius through a meru wireless controller.
  • Our print server is 2012 R2 with about 25 printers.
  • Each of these printers have a DHCP assigned address.
  • None of our desktop (windows 8.1 pro) systems have this problem.
  • Printers are added by users using a vbs script.

This is our setup, hope it helps :)

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March 18th, 2014 4:53am

Thanks for the information regarding print server target OS.    I would love to understand the networking configuration that exposes this issue but having a solution in place is a bit more important.  This is not an issue we experience in our network configuration on ma
March 18th, 2014 12:09pm

It's not a user / admin specific issue but it's related to wireless networks on mobile devices. The specific print device is not a play here, it's the client's spooler connection to the remote spooler on the print server.  When the print spooler is stopped and started on the client, all the printers and connections are initialized so the server is no longer marked as Offline.

It is also related to something in the network configuration but I have never hit the issue so have not traced network packets.

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March 18th, 2014 9:22pm

Thanks for the information regarding print server target OS.    I would love to understand the networking configuration that exposes this issue but having a solution in place is a bit more important.  This is not an issue we experience in our network configuration on main ca

March 19th, 2014 5:30am

I don't know if this will help Alan, but this is what I have found to date.

I have a HP Laptop and Surface both 8.1, the HP Laptop has had Hibernation mode disabled.  This effectively ensures that EVERY reboot IS a REBOOT, rather than the default mode in Win8.x.  All of our printers are Network printers some that are through servers (Win2K8 R2) and others direct network printing.

The errors we are seeing happens with both devices and states that the Server Spooler is not running, this is not true.  As other have pointed out doing a net stop spooler and net start spooler will temporarily fix the issue, I have better things to do with my time that to go to multiple clients, multiple times a day to perform this task.

In addition there have been times that even restarting the spooler will NOT fix the problem.

A really interesting point is that if you print to OneNote no issue exists, this tends to suggest that the problem is NOT directly related to the spooler but a timeout from the interfaces/ports within the spooler.

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March 19th, 2014 6:04am

After testing for a bit over a week, I think we've stopped the problem happening.  No staff have reported it, and the test staff I've kept in touch with haven't had it.  We pushed out a group policy to untick the setting Power Options > System Settings > Shutdown Settings > Turn on fast startup (recommended).  Once staff had this unticked, the problem stopped.  My theory is that the "fast start" was causing connectivity problems with the print server.  Thanks for the person upthread who suggested this, I'd be keen to hear of anyone else's experiences if you give this a try.

March 20th, 2014 8:09am

Update from Microsoft support :

Tittle of the case :Win 8 and 8.1 client showing shared printer server as offline
support number :114022811224491
severity level : C

Microsoft as identified that's is a bug and fix it soon as possible with a fix/patch. Shortly Microsoft send me an email for download the patch and test it.

Waiting you can do this action (alternative solution before will the patch is release) :

Pushed out a group policy (or gpedit.msc on the local PC) Computer configuration\ Adminitratives Templates\System\Shutdown\. to untick/DISABLE the setting Power Options > System Settings > Shutdown Settings > Turn on fast startup (recommended). Normally that's stop the problem.

-----
Or another alternative solution (Microsoft send me this new solution by email today):

Under regedit : create a new key name "EnabledProtocols" Type DWORD - Data = 6 Under this key : HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Printers\EnabledProtocols
Reboot the computer and test if that's resolve the problem

--> i test this solution today, it's not applicable for Win 8 because the folder "printers" doesn't exist" VS Win 7.
--------


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March 20th, 2014 9:32pm

Hi everyone,

we also opened a case with Microsoft and received a bunch of solutions to apply in no particular order.

It's quite difficult to test because I do not work with the same configuration as the users so everyday I ask to several users coming back from teleworking to tell me what happens with their printers.


March 31st, 2014 12:04pm

Can you send us the information about the KB article or bug number that we can reference. As someone stated earlier. "Our customers are angry, and don't believe us anymore." While professionally I do not install latest/greatest software, the business owners often like to buy laptops with the latest/greatest software. Then it doesn't work right, and they blame IT. If there's some way I can shift the focus to "Microsoft is working on it." Here is the article. I can take the heat off, and they will be content for a while until the patch/fix comes out.

-Matt

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March 31st, 2014 7:39pm

Also having the same issue on Surface Pro 2, on a domain, connected to network printers deployed via GPO.
Restarting the Spooler Service has been the only working solution this far. I will try disabling fast start-up until a fix is available, hopefully soon!
April 1st, 2014 4:29am

Hello,

here is a reference you may find useful : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2713128

It is part of the answer we received from Microsoft.  Another trick proposed is to add a registry key in order to change a delay

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Printers]
"DestinationReachablePollingInterval"=dword:00000005

In my opinion Microsoft tries to guess what is happening.  We are working with 3 main print servers and 17 in our branch offices to print on 250+ printers.  Fortunately only 200 users out of 1300 are equipped with Windows 8.1 but I fear some kind of "riot" in the company if a solution is not found quickly.

And another reference : 

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-hardware/network-printer-shows-offline-on-windows-8/7851703b-492c-4e97-8063-f1fc2aa63ec0?page=2

  • Edited by MobiSerge Tuesday, April 01, 2014 9:53 AM
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April 1st, 2014 12:49pm

The alternative solution with the regedit Under Windows 8 isn't possible because the Folder named "Printers" doesn't exist.

I "re"launch Microsoft Support by email for request their Development Department the release date of the patch, i hope is soon...

To be continued...

April 1st, 2014 3:16pm

The team providing the fix can't, actually should not, give you a release date.  I will strive to update this thread when a fix is publically available.  If you have a support case the support person dealing with that case should contact you as well.

MobiSerge:  Thank you for the pointer to the post in Answers.

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April 1st, 2014 8:13pm

To add to the discussion, we are having the same issue. We are running Server 2012 Essentials. The only machine having the problem is a Surface Pro 2 running 8.1. All of our other systems run 7 with a couple still on XP. We have one multifunction Cannon Printer, a B&W Savin large format Plotter, & a large format Cannon Color plotter. 

The printers show as offline and cannot reconnect when the person connects (wired) to the network while the printers are in sleep mode. The user can only get the printers to show online by waking up the printers and then restarting his computer.

Today I applied the "fix" of turning off fast startup. I cannot confirm the effectiveness of this solution until tomorrow morning when he reconnects while the printers are in sleep mode. If this fix does not work, I plan on mapping the networked printers directly rather than through the server print spooler as suggested above to see if that works.

I'll update as I know more.

April 2nd, 2014 4:37pm

I am also having this issue. We have 25 printers on server 2012 that worked perfectly last year with 500 windows 7 laptops. This year we have 500 windows 8.1 laptops and we see this exact problem sometimes. Restarting the spooler fixed the issue but rebooting does not. So a hotfix would be great to fix this issue. 
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April 4th, 2014 2:38am

Hello all,

I have a customer running en Essentials 2012 R2 and have 8.1 clients experiencing similar issue. It is not all the clients having the issue but some. The customer cannot pinpoint any specific software differences between them.

I have not applied any workarounds and the end users should not need to do this either.

April 8th, 2014 3:38pm

Disabling fast startup fixed the problem for us. Now whether or not the printers are in sleep mode when the user connects his 8.1 tablet to the network, the printers are shown as ready and the user can print to them. Thank you to whomever first recommended this fix, it worked for us.
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April 9th, 2014 3:48pm

We have this issue also, deploying Surface Pro 2 with Windows 8.1. Works fine until the user closes the tablet and disconnects from the network. They go to a meeting then reattach to the network and printers remain offline (restarting spooler or full restart beings them back). Additionally, if they leave a document open from a shared drive while disconnecting / reconnecting to the network, the document cannot be saved as it is 'locked by another user'. This user is of course the same user that opened it before disconnecting, so windows is not recognising this on reattach. I've just turned off Fast start and the printers do seem to come back now, but sometimes it takes up to 5 minutes which seems excessive. Can anyone confirm the symptom with leaving a network document open while disconnecting / reconnecting? We are using Office 2013.
April 14th, 2014 1:16am

Microsoft release a patch for beta test, normally today i must receive the link by email for download it. (i share it soon as possible)

After 3/4 weeks if the patch resolve definitevely this issue Microsoft publish the fix on their official website.


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April 15th, 2014 3:52pm

Tnx for sharing... as soon as possible!
April 15th, 2014 3:54pm

also looking forward to a fix!  Thanks for keeping us posted on your progress Arnault.  
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April 15th, 2014 5:37pm

I really do hope that the solution works now Arnault, i've been searching so many fixes and tried with different registry fixes without succeeding.

Please notify ASAP how it will work, cause right now the customer of mine is getting irritated by the problem, even when our department isnt the cause of the problem

April 16th, 2014 4:49pm

Arnault PEREIRA said something about a beta patch? Any feedback on that, Alan?

My client had put the brakes on all new Win8 purchases as they don't want this happening. Unfortunately, the main person it affects is the head of the organization, so until he's happy, I don't get to do any upgrades.

So, seriously, any updates? :-/

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April 16th, 2014 9:43pm

What type of feedback are you looking for?

I can't tell you when the release will be but I'll post here when it's public.

As far as I know, a fix will only be generated for Windows 8.1.  The patch that I have seen was in spooler code and has worked but the underlying network change that exposed the issue was still a concern.   I do not know if Arnault is running with the same change.  I doubt it since I only had a test signed binary and I don't think the support team would hand that to customers.

April 17th, 2014 12:59am

Tnx Alan for your professional answer.

But if for me the problem is limited to 2 or 3 PCs, for other people like YonNomNom the amount of I-Dont-Print-Users is 500...

Believe me, is not so simple to explain for us poor IT Managers that this problem has no solution after some month...

We have tried ALL the suggestions present in this forum... Disable Fastboot, disable SNMP, DISABLE WINDOWS!

We can try also a BETA fix, do you think?

TIA for what you can share (again)...


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April 17th, 2014 11:47am

What type of feedback are you looking for?

I can't tell you when the release will be but I'll post here when it's public.

As far as I know, a fix will only be generated for Windows 8.1.  The patch that I have seen was in spooler code and has worked but the underlying network change that exposed the issue was still a concern.   I do not know if Arnault is running with the same change.  I doubt it since I only had a test signed binary and I don't think the support team would hand that to customers.

April 17th, 2014 1:20pm

We have the same problem and I would gladly try the beta patch if it was released.

// John

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April 17th, 2014 1:30pm

Im also having this problem with windows 8.1 clients. Please fix asap!
April 18th, 2014 10:22am

Microsoft release a patch for beta test, normally today i must receive the link by email for download it. (i share it soon as possible)

After 3/4 weeks if the patch resolve definitevely this issue Microsoft publish the fix on their official website.



News? Or someone ask you to stop sharing?...
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April 18th, 2014 6:48pm

When a Knowledge Base article is written and typically a fix is released under the same link, then it's official.  I'm not with any customer support team so I'm not sure how they get patches to customers.  Starting a support case as Arnault PEREIRA did will get much more attention than posting here, although I think this thread has generated some interest due to the number of people who have reached out.    Arnault did mention an ETA.

April 18th, 2014 8:01pm

Finally Microsoft contact me (Dimitar Tsvetkov) by phone this end of week for give me more explanation on this issue. He will send me the patch the next week for test it (normally the final client can't test the patch in beta version, but Dimitar think like me it's better if the patch is test outdoor Microsoft organization and in view of the circumstances of this issue for approve it before that the public version will release). If this patch resolve this issue, Microsoft publish it on the public website, the publication time starts usually 4-5 weeks... !!! It's not cool for Win8 users and the client will want to migrate Under win8... But it's Microsoft process... So be patient...
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April 19th, 2014 3:46pm

Hi, me too.

I have two Win 8.1 machines that have the printer offline problem.

I'm deploying Win 8.1.1 now on 3 more machines, will report in if they have the same issues.

Anyone knows what's the trigger for this? From what I read, to reproduce it, it's as simple as unplugging and replugging your LAN?

April 23rd, 2014 11:54am

Hello everyone,

like Arnault we also have a ticket opened with Microsoft and we received the same info this week.  A patch is written, Microsoft is testing and it must be released soon.  We are waiting this patch and until we receive it the deployment of Windows 8.1 is stopped.

Cheers,


  • Edited by MobiSerge Wednesday, April 23, 2014 12:37 PM
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April 23rd, 2014 3:11pm

We have seen this issue intermittently on Surface Pro 2's running Win 8.1 Enterprise, connecting to a Server 2008 R2 print server.  Users are admins.  Looking forward to the patch!
April 28th, 2014 6:42pm

Print servers: Windows 2008 R2

Printers: Xerox, HP

Only Windows 8.1 laptops have experienced this issue. Restarting print spooler fixes it but we can't do it for hundreds users.

This is major problem and we have delayed Windows 8.1 upgrade until this issue is correctly fixed by Microsoft.


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April 30th, 2014 12:03pm

So...  Any updates regarding this? I tried to create a case at Microsoft, and they told me the case would be created within a few days... after 1 week, still nothing! Gonna have to call them again -.-

Cause right now, we got a customer at 2 sites...

May 6th, 2014 9:40am

We are just starting to add Windows 8.1 systems to our network and we are seeing this.  The only fix I have found is to restart the Print Spooler service.
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May 6th, 2014 7:15pm

Time to chime in - same issue, I've been following this for months.

Windows 8.1 mobile clients on a domain, Windows 2008 Print server (pre R2)

I have a cmd file saved on the desktop of my 8.1 users (that stops and starts the print spooler). My users are local admins.

Pretty frustrated with this issue, being the sole admin/helpdesk for ~1000 users.

May 7th, 2014 1:36am

Hello !

Same issue here :

Windows 8.1

Some times, for some users .. network printer goes offline.

As printer, we use the Uniflow system (users need to swap their badges in order to have the printing document).

Need to have a fix asap please ...

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May 8th, 2014 12:53pm

Me too

Exact same problem, Really hope MS get a fix soon, it is a showstopper for rolling out Windows 8(.1)

May 8th, 2014 2:13pm

Same problem here, all Surface Pro 2 tablets. Restarting the Print Spooler helps for some time.
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May 9th, 2014 11:04am

Did this hot fix make it to today's Patch Tuesday updates?

May 13th, 2014 8:13pm

 Thanks everyone for your input. 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2961042/en-us
Printer server goes offline when you wake up the computer at another network location in Windows RT 8.1 or Windows 8.1

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May 13th, 2014 9:42pm

KB released today - 2961042 Printer server goes offline when you wake up the computer at another network location in Windows RT 8.1 or Windows 8.1
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2961042/en-us

This is available via update rollup 2955164  Windows RT 8.1, Windows 8.1, and Windows Server 2012 R2 update rollup: May 2014
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2955164

This link for 2955164 should be live some time today.

Thanks everyone for your patience on getting this fixed.

May 13th, 2014 9:43pm

Thanks, for the update.  I can confirm that it showed up in WSUS, waiting for the download so it can be installed.  

On a side note, it's sad that IE 11 on Win 8.1 doesn't work when trying to reply to this thread.  The "Reply" button doesn't expand the response field.  

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May 14th, 2014 3:50pm

What about Windows 8?  We've experience this issue with a number of Windows 8 systems as well.
May 14th, 2014 10:52pm

Alleluiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa !!!

Printer server goes offline when you wake up the computer at another network location in Windows RT 8.1 or Windows 8.1

Symptoms

  Consider the following scenario:

  • You have a computer that is running Windows RT 8.1, Windows 8.1, or Windows Server 2012 R2.
  • You connect to a printer server that is shared on a Windows Server.
  • You put the computer into a sleep mode and move it to another network location.
  • You wake up the computer and try to print by using the shared printer.
In the scenario, the printer server goes offline in the client spooler even though it is actually reachable. 

Resolution

To resolve this issue, install update rollup 2955164. For more information about how to obtain this update rollup package, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: 2955164           Windows RT 8.1, Windows 8.1, and Windows Server 2012 R2 update rollup: May 2014

Article :

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2961042

Correctif rollup :

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2955164

Let me know if this rollup resolve your issue, normally that's work !

Best,

A. Pereira

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May 15th, 2014 11:52am

We have applied this to several Windows 8.1 machines and they all continue to have the same printers offline issue.

Wonderful.
May 16th, 2014 9:35pm

Have you shutdown the computer few second and after start it again ?

Because if you restart your computer only, this patch have no effect.

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May 20th, 2014 2:03pm

I have a similar problem here. 

I'm maintaining a POS system in a restaurant. There are two terminals, one is an Asus running Windows 7 and the other is a Sony Vaio Tap 20 running Win 8.1. Both computers are fully up to date as of today in terms of windows updates and drivers.

There are two ethernet Epson TM-T20 receipt printers. One is connected to the same switch as the two terminals via cat5, and the other is connected via a wireless bridge in the kitchen.

The Win7 computer has no problems whatsoever printing to either printer at any time.

The Win8.1 computer has no problems printing to the printer that's connected via ethernet. However, the printer that's connected via the wifi bridge frequently appears offline. When the print command is sent, a Windows 8.1 popup appears at the top-right hand side of the screen saying the printer is not available. 

Sometimes it suddenly starts printing after a few seconds delay. Other times the job is stuck in the local queue, with the status showing "Printing". 

If I call up the same order and print it from the Win7 terminal, it prints just fine.

I added the printers manually by creating a standard tcp/ip port in the windows printer setup. I've also tried using the Epson software to install the printer - it makes no difference.

So my situation is a bit different as there's no Windows server, and the computers are not on a domain.

I'm going to try disabling fast startup now.

 

May 23rd, 2014 8:36am

Same issue here - even after the update. We have a Windows 2012 print server and are running Windows 8 and 8.1.

The 8.1 machines have printers offline daily

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June 10th, 2014 12:27pm

Here Windows Server 2012 R2 (printsrv) and windows 8.1 client show offline printer.  No problem on Windows 7 . I try all update and setting and nothing.... 
June 10th, 2014 5:39pm

What is the file date for \windows\system32\win32spl.dll on the client machines.

Also make sure that you can contact the print server using RPCPING.exe

C:\>rpcping -s SERVERNAME
Completed 1 calls in 47 ms
21 T/S or  47.000 ms/T

If you get something like this, you have something blocking the rpc transport layer

C:\>rpcping -s SERVERNAME
Exception 1722 (0x000006BA)
Number of records is: 3

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June 10th, 2014 10:28pm

 the file date for \windows\system32\win32spl.dll on the client machines is on 4/18/2014.

June 11th, 2014 10:55pm

That looks correct. 

This make sure the client is reporting the print server is Offline

powershell -command "get-printer '\\SERVER\Printer'|select Name, PrinterStatus"

you should get

PrinterStatus
-------------
ServerOffline

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June 12th, 2014 3:44am

I have a similar problem. I have 2 x new (a couple of weeks old) HP 23" touch screens, one running Windows 8 and one just updated to Windows 8.1. I have just purchased a new Billion/BIPAC 7800NXL modem/router with USB print server built in. On my Windows 7 laptop and Windows 8 HP Touchscreen  I installed the printers and the print server works fine with a 5 year old Epson TX600FW and 6 month old WF-3520 Epson printer.

I can not get it to work on the Windows 8.1 HP Touchscreen. When I install the printer it says it's installed but it doesn't print and Control Panel reports error on the printer. I have loaded all the latest Windows updates, machine is set to auto update as well. I have removed fast boot and I have stopped the spooler and started it again but no fix.

I want Windows 8.1 for my 85 year old mother as it has many layout configurations similar to her old PC. I prefer 8.1 as well so am keen to upgrade. Any ideas on how I can fix this print problem?

Maybe I have accidentally changed something in 8.1, but I am not keen to upgrade the other HP to 8.1 in case the same thing happens to it as I have read you have to do a restore to get back to Windows 8. Any assistance would be good. Thanks in advance.


EDIT: Well I"ve just set up another pc with 8.1 and have the print server running! I have been thru and checked all settings and can't see where I have accidently set something incorrectly, but of course the possibility is there. It appears I will have to do an W8 reinstall and upgrade to 8.1 again and see how I go.
  • Edited by aslenod Sunday, June 15, 2014 11:29 PM
June 13th, 2014 11:41am

We have test this patch on a lot of machine with any different environment, the patch release by Microsoft for this issue : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2961042 

After we have installed this hotfix anything change, i will try to reopen the case at Microsoft support or open a new case...

Is not acceptable, Microsoft release this patch after 6 months and don't it work ?!

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June 15th, 2014 7:40pm

I've had the same issues with a surface pro on an HP wireless printer...tried to download the update and it says "the update is not applicable to your computer"..?  Also unticked the turn on fast start up button which now only works if I print, then restart computer. After the computer restarts (which I have to do every time I print) is when the printing will happen.

Thoughts?

June 25th, 2014 1:31am

You are hitting a networking issue regarding the HP device.  I'll assume you are attached to the device using WSD network transport. 

You can switch to a Standard TCP/IP Port or you can enable Network Discovery for Private network in Network and Sharing Center / Advanced sharing settings.   It got disabled when you joined a public network and does not get reset properly.

I think there is a hotfix at some point but since it's in networking it's off my radar and outside my normal search filters.

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June 25th, 2014 4:02am

Thanks Alan...it looks like that fixed it for me!
June 27th, 2014 7:25pm

the Update 2647753 is already installed but it didn't solve the problem.

We have already tried the workarounds and it solves the problem but only temporary.

I hope we get some update from Microsoft that solves the problem definitely.

 

I agree. same Situation here.

Any update from Microsoft?

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July 2nd, 2014 1:50pm

A lot of Professional customers on Windows 8/8.1 have this issue, the fix/update doesn't resolve it.

We have applied an alternative solution : uncheck Under "gpedit.msc" this option "Turn on Fast Startup" fixed this issue, since november 2013.

But it's not a professional solution and that create another problem, the system take more time for start up, if we use the sleep mode we must reboot the system for resolve it...

Since november 2013, Microsoft take a lot of week for release a fix; and a lot of customers test this fix but didn't solve this issue. Since May 2014 we don't have any answer from Microsoft, isn't acceptable...

Please Alan Moris, can you contact Windows 8 Team for report this issue ?

Cheers,
A Pereira.

Innate Pharma SA
Engineer IT

MSCE 2003, 2012 Server Infrastructure and Private Cloud | MCSA 2003, 2008, 7, 8, 2012 | MCITP 2008, 7 | MCTS AD, Application and Network Infrastructure, 7 | MCDST XP

July 31st, 2014 9:34pm

I can't contact the correct team any longer.  Microsoft laid me off. I'm not sure why you are still experiencing the issue, the fix addressed the issue we had at Microsoft remote locations.  I was never sure why the people on the primary Microsoft campus never encountered this problem. 

Time to take this back to the support team.

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July 31st, 2014 11:18pm

Alan, if  here's a lot of people with the same problem, that means that the problem itself exists...
I have only 4 pc's with windows 8.1, but the printers offline problem random appear to... THE CHIEF!!!

Believe to all of US!!!

August 1st, 2014 12:52pm

You answer isn't acceptable for professionnal users... Are you an employee of Microsoft Corporation ??

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August 1st, 2014 3:16pm

Goodmorning.

After a re-format of my laptop, I have again the problem.
I've tried all the troubleshooting in this forum, and something worked, but don't know what...
The format cause the problem retrurns itself.
Again, the only way to use the "offline" printers is to restart spool service via batch runnng it as administrator.
I leave here the code for who need it.

respool.bat

@echo off
net stop spooler
FOR /l %%a in (10,-1,1) do (ping -n 1 -w 1000 127.0.0.1>NUL)
net start spooler

And... WHEN this problem DISAPPEAR?
Someone are working on it?

W.


September 9th, 2014 10:13am

Hello Alan,

I have a client with one Windows 8.1 Surface Pro 2 with the same problem.  I am posting my original question that I posted to MS here.  The tech at MS wanted me to install hotfixes that did not pertain to the system and would not install.  If you have any suggestions please let me know.

Shared printers change to remote printer ports

Hello All,

A client has a Windows 8.1 machine that is having printer issues.  There are two network printers (one is a shared printer on the network with an IP address and the other is a shared printer from another computer) that will change their ports to Remote Printer Ports once a week and I have to remove them and re-add them.

The printer that is connected locally on one of the other desktops that is shared shows up as a virtual USB port on the Windows 8.1 machine when it is connected properly and working.  The network printer with it's own IP address shows with the proper IP address when working properly. 

When they both go off-line their ports both show as Remote Printer Ports.  For the printer that is physically connected to another desktop and shared it shows as USB001 for the port and the one with it's own IP on the network shows as 10.0.0.2 for the Port (10.0.0.2 is the address of the server).

PLEASE NOTE THAT I AM USING THE CORRECT WINDOWS 8.1 DRIVERS THAT ARE AVAILABLE FROM BOTH DELL AND XEROX FOR THESE PRINTERS.  DO NOT ASK ME TO REINSTALL DRIVERS AS A FIX FOR THIS PROBLEM.  ALSO, THIS PROBLEM DOES NOT OCCUR WITH ANY WINDOWS 7 MACHINE.  THE PRINTER CONNECTED TO THE DESKTOP THAT IS SHARED IS LISTED IN THE DIRECTORY AND IS ON A WINDOWS 7 MACHINE.

Here are some pictures:

Printer connected to other desktop when working

Image

Printer connected to other desktop when not working

Image

Printer on network with own IP when not working

Image


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October 8th, 2014 10:07pm

I understand, all the programmers/developers are working on Windows 10 or what-is-his-name, and 8.1 problems now??? Who solves them???
October 23rd, 2014 1:08pm

If anyone has a support contract with MS, call in and create a case. Give them my name and I can point them in the right direction.  If anyone new finds this post please throw in a "me too", there are other people watching this.

Does disabling Network Discovery on Domain networks help on the mobile clients?

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November 20th, 2014 8:26am

The only way to take control of our printers is Restart Spool...
February 18th, 2015 5:36am

We're having this same problem on our new Surface Pro 3s. So far the only workaround we've found is to restart the Print Spooler, which is a pain to do every morning when people bring their tablets back into the office.
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March 5th, 2015 9:54am

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