The Printer Won't Print: Documents Stuck in the Queue, "Printer Offline" and Other Windows Printing Errors

The printer is one of the most temperamental devices in any home or office. Yesterday everything printed; today the document sits in the queue with the status "Error", the printer shows as "Offline" even though its light is green, or pages come out covered in strange symbols instead of text. It usually happens at the worst moment — when you urgently need to print a contract or a boarding pass. Let's look at why Windows won't print and how to fix it.

How printing works in Windows

When you press "Print", the program hands the document to a system service — the print spooler. Using the printer driver, the spooler converts the document into the "language" that particular model understands, places the job in the queue and sends it to the printer over USB, Wi-Fi or the network. A failure at any of these stages — in the program, the service, the driver, the connection or the printer itself — means nothing prints.

The most common problems

A document stuck in the queue

One damaged or oversized job blocks the whole queue: the documents after it don't print either. Clearing the queue often helps, but if it keeps happening, the cause lies deeper — in the driver or the print service.

The printer is "Offline"

With USB printers this can be caused by a bad cable, a hub or USB power-saving mode. With network and Wi-Fi printers it's often because the printer's IP address changed after the router restarted: Windows looks for the printer at the old address and can't find it.

The wrong or a "generic" driver

Windows sometimes automatically installs a basic driver that lets the printer work without some of its features — no double-sided printing, wrong margins or gibberish instead of text. On multifunction devices, the scanner doesn't work without the full driver.

Problems after a Windows update

Security updates sometimes change the rules for network printers and drivers. Afterwards a shared office printer stops working on some computers or needs administrator rights to install the driver.

The wrong default printer

Windows can automatically make the last printer you used the default. As a result documents go to "Microsoft Print to PDF", a fax or a printer in another office.

Problems with the printer itself

The toner or ink has run out, paper has jammed, the printer is waiting for confirmation on its own screen, a non-original cartridge has been "blocked", or it needs servicing. Windows doesn't always show these states correctly.

Network printing in the office

In offices the printer is often connected to one computer and "shared" with the others. That's an unreliable arrangement: if the main computer is off, restarting or updating, printing stops for everyone. It's much more stable to connect the printer to the network directly — by cable or Wi-Fi — with a fixed IP address, and to install the correct driver on every computer.

What not to do

• Download drivers from dubious "drivers for every printer" sites — malware is common there.
• Install one driver over another again and again — conflicting versions pile up in the system.
• Delete print-service system files following forum advice.
• Try to take the printer apart to clear a paper jam unless you're sure — you can damage the mechanism.

How a technician restores printing

The specialist checks the printer itself and the connection, then clears the queue, checks and restarts the print service, removes conflicting and outdated drivers and installs the correct driver from the manufacturer's website. For network printers, a permanent IP address is set on the router or printer, along with the correct print port and, if needed, scan-to-folder or scan-to-email.

For a busy office, it's also worth thinking about the printer itself. A cheap home inkjet that's printing hundreds of pages a week will keep jamming and running out of ink, while a modest network laser printer often costs less per page and causes far fewer calls for help. We're happy to give honest advice if replacement makes more sense than repeated repairs.

What our technician does

1. Checks the printer, cartridges, cables and network connection.
2. Clears a stuck queue and gets the print service running again.
3. Removes surplus drivers and installs the correct manufacturer driver.
4. Sets up a network printer with a fixed address for all the office computers.
5. Configures scanning, double-sided printing and the default printer.

A real example

At a notary's office in Vake, after a weekend the shared printer stopped printing on three of the four computers: documents sat in the queue with the status "Error". It turned out the printer was shared from the secretary's computer, and after a Windows update and a router restart its address had changed. Our technician connected the printer to the network directly, gave it a permanent IP address, installed the manufacturer's full driver on all the computers and set up scanning straight into a shared folder. Now printing doesn't depend on whether the secretary's computer is on.

Call a technician

If your printer won't print or you need network printing set up in the office, we'll come to any district of Tbilisi around the clock. Learn more on our driver installation, local network setup and computer setup pages.