Perplexing WinXP Problem with Printers

[BadThad]

At work we run WinXP and Office 2003. I'm having a very annoying, intermittant issue with the virtual printer ports changing on some machines. We run a lot of complicated Excel marcos, when the virtual printer port changes, the macro's will not run when a print job hits. Here's an example:

The macro depends on the NE port and printer name which is held in the registry under HKCU, example:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Devices]
"Microsoft Office Document Image Writer"="winspool,Ne00:"
"Adobe PDF"="winspool,Ne01:"
"\\\\CIMUSSRV03\\iploffice - HP LaserJet 5"="winspool,Ne02:"
"\\\\cimussrv03\\Sdfoffice - HP LaserJet 4240"="winspool,Ne03:"
"\\\\CIMUSSRV03\\XRX8560 - Lab Color Printer"="winspool,Ne04:"
"Solid Converter PDF v4"="winspool,Ne05:"

Just yesterday I had a macro stop due to the order of the printers changing on a users PC. I wiped all the printers, put them back in a specific order to maintain the Ne port numbers (they simply increment up), exported the reg key for reference and corrected the macro port ID's so Excel ran fine.

Later in the day, the user logged off the domain at lunch and logged back in afterward. Lo and behold, the printer that WAS on Ne03 moved to Ne00 and bumped all the other printers up an Ne port. Of course, the user made NO CHANGES to the printers manually....they don't even know how to. For some reason, WinXP decided to do this on it's own. I checked with our MIS domain admin and he swears there's nothing that would affect printers during logon.

ANY IDEAS WHY WINDOWS DOES THIS? Any ideas on how to STOP it from doing this?

 

[robisbell]

why are you even using virtuals (adobe pdf, solid converter, document image writer) on a network setup? last I heard, they are assigned after physical and networked printers are connected upon reboot or login.

 

[BadThad]

This is not the config from a problem machine, just mine as an example....no problems for me, I don't run the macros.

However, we do have acrobat distiller on the problem PC's, then only networked printers (no physically attached printers). The problem is NOT with Acrobat, but with networked printers. These are all run from a domain print server. Those are the Ne ports that change on occassion. I should have been more clear, it's the networked printers than change Ne ports.

Thanks

 

[BadThad]

Bump!

 

[BadThad]

Nobody, eh?

 

[montag451]

I don't know ANYTHING about this subject - but just looking at it,
You were saying it is the networked printers that change the ports.
Would it be worth a try to set the applications from what you have set them up:
<b>
"Microsoft Office Document Image Writer"="winspool,Ne00:"
"Adobe PDF"="winspool,Ne01:"
"Solid Converter PDF v4"="winspool,Ne05:"</b>

to
"Microsoft Office Document Image Writer"="winspool,Ne03:"
"Adobe PDF"="winspool,Ne04:"
"\\\\CIMUSSRV03\\iploffice - HP LaserJet 5"="winspool,Ne00:"
"\\\\cimussrv03\\Sdfoffice - HP LaserJet 4240"="winspool,Ne01:"
"\\\\CIMUSSRV03\\XRX8560 - Lab Color Printer"="winspool,Ne02:"
"Solid Converter PDF v4"="winspool,Ne05:"

See if it is the software that is buggering up your settings.

As i said, this is not my field, but if you are desparate, try this and post back with the results.