Thursday, September 9, 2010

printing issues in XP

So, the receptionist/front desk person just had to print out a recipe on a company computer and company printer and company paper....(small rant)

Anyway, after hitting print, it repeatedly printed out the same thing. Logging off, back on did not help. Logging on as another user did not help. Rebooting did not help. It would come up with the error:

“Spoolsv.exe - Application Error"

“The instruction at "0x77fcc2c0" referenced memory at "0x00000000".

“The memory could not be written."

and continue to print over and over.

I ran malwarebytes, McAfee, and found a few things, yet did not solve the problem. Then I stumbled upon these instructions:

The Spoolsv.exe executable file is responsible for handling the printing process on a Microsoft Windows system. Although this process is not crucial to run your Windows system, you must not terminate it until you think that it is causing problems on the system. In this article we will learn how to fix the Spoolsv.exe application error.

When the error occurs, you may receive an error message similar to the one given below.

“Spoolsv.exe - Application Error"

“The instruction at "0x77fcc2c0" referenced memory at "0x00000000".

“The memory could not be written."

The most common cause of the error is an abundance of .SHD and .SPL files in the spool directory. These files are created by the spooler to save the spooled data of a print job. The .SPL file comprises drawing commands and the .SHD file comprises job settings information of the print job.

To fix spoolsv.exe application error, you will have to remove these files from the system. To do this, perform the following steps on your Windows XP computer:

1. Open Control Panel, select Performance and Maintenance, select Administrative Tools and then select the Services option.
2. In the Services management console, locate the Spooler services, right-click on it and select Stop.
3. Next, open the C:\Windows\System32\Spool\Printers folder. (Here, we are assuming that your Windows is installed in the default C:\Windows folder)
4. Delete all the .SHD and SPL files from this folder.
5. Next, open the TMP folder and delete all old and unused files from this folder.
6. Finally, restart the Spooler service from the Services management console.

Note: If you are unable to delete the files in Normal Mode, then you may have to restart your computer in Safe Mode to delete the files. To start your PC in Safe Mode, press F8 at system restart and then select the Safe Mode option from Windows Advanced Options Menu.

If deleting the files does not rectify the problem, you must perform a System Restore and rollback your system to the time prior to when the error started appearing on your computer. To perform System Restore, open Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools, and then select the System Restore option. On the Welcome to System Restore Screen, select the Restore my computer to an earlier time option, and select Next. On the Select Restore Point screen, select the date that represents the restore point to which you want to roll back your computer and then select Next. Finally, verify and then click Next again to confirm your restore point and proceed with the system restore. Restart your PC when prompted and press OK to close the system restore completion screen.

This resolved the issue, and the computer was back to normal.

Sometimes you are the windshield, sometimes you are the bug....