[SOLVED] Printer suddenly prints files it wasn't able to print yesterday

Oct 1, 2019
7
0
10
Hi,

So we've got two computers and one printer. The printer is connected to one of those computers, lets call it PC A, and it is shared on the network so the other PC, PC B, can also access it.

That setup was doing fine until one day PC B suddenly can't access the printer while PC A still works fine. It says it can't find the printer even though its still there shared on the network. Restarting the PCs (both A and B) and printer, re-sharing the printer, deleting the printer and printer driver then adding it again in PC B wont solve the problem.
Every time this happens, I need to delete printer and printer driver then reinstall it again in PC A to make things work again for PC B. This happens once or twice every week and I cant really find the solution for this because I don't even know what the root problem is.

Then the other day the problem happened again but that time I didn't reinstalled the printer driver in PC A and left the PC B unable to print because I was still working in printer A and printing some documents. Whats weird is the next day when i turned on the printer(both PCs were just turned on too for 30 min - 1 hr before the printer),the files from PC B that it wasn't able to print yesterday suddenly printed. It wasn't immediately printed after turning on the printer but after some time.

Any thoughts about this guys?

In printer sharing settings, print jobs are rendered on client computer. It really feels weird since both PC's were turned off for a night then was just turned on maybe 30 min - 1 hr before the printer was turned on, where did that print job came from?

PRINTER MODEL: BROTHER DCP-T500W
PC A & B- Both are using Windows 7 32 bit

Thanks!
 
Solution
Windows printer sharing is incredibly unstable. I've found it to be one of the least reliable Windows functionalities ever.

That being said, Computer A needs to be turned on and have an active, working connection with the printer for Computer B to be able to print. It is possible that connection was temporarily interrupted when the print job was sent from Computer B. When Computer A picked the connection with the printerback up, the print job was pushed to the printer again.

I'm afraid there's not much you can do, unless you decide to purchase something like a USB print server of some sorts. In my experience so far, that has proved to be more reliable. Of course purchasing the cheapest product could make it worse, so I'm not sure if...
Windows printer sharing is incredibly unstable. I've found it to be one of the least reliable Windows functionalities ever.

That being said, Computer A needs to be turned on and have an active, working connection with the printer for Computer B to be able to print. It is possible that connection was temporarily interrupted when the print job was sent from Computer B. When Computer A picked the connection with the printerback up, the print job was pushed to the printer again.

I'm afraid there's not much you can do, unless you decide to purchase something like a USB print server of some sorts. In my experience so far, that has proved to be more reliable. Of course purchasing the cheapest product could make it worse, so I'm not sure if saving a couple dollars will work in your favor.
 
Solution
Oct 1, 2019
7
0
10
Windows printer sharing is incredibly unstable. I've found it to be one of the least reliable Windows functionalities ever.

That being said, Computer A needs to be turned on and have an active, working connection with the printer for Computer B to be able to print. It is possible that connection was temporarily interrupted when the print job was sent from Computer B. When Computer A picked the connection with the printerback up, the print job was pushed to the printer again.

I'm afraid there's not much you can do, unless you decide to purchase something like a USB print server of some sorts. In my experience so far, that has proved to be more reliable. Of course purchasing the cheapest product could make it worse, so I'm not sure if saving a couple dollars will work in your favor.

I've thought that it might've been interrupted too, but won't the print job be cancelled since the computer have been turned off?

Thanks for the response@ taeioum
 
I've thought that it might've been interrupted too, but won't the print job be cancelled since the computer have been turned off?

Thanks for the response@ taeioum
It shouldn't be canceled. What computer B does is try to send the print job to computer A, which in turn should send it to the printer. When computer B sends it, it realises that computer A is unreachable and the print job should hang in the printer job list.