[German]Update KB4517211 for Windows 10 Version 1903, released on September 26, 2019 ,seems to cause issues with printers for some users. The printer queue fails and no printers are found.
I’ve mentioned the topic before, along with other problems, briefly in the blog post Windows 10 Problems with Windows 10: Issues with Updates KB4522015, KB4522016 / KB4517211 (Sept. 2019). Since then I’ve received a couple of confirmations of the issue from blog readers. Because Microsoft has classified Windows 10 Version 1903 as ‘ready for widespread use’ as of September 26, 2019, I’ve extracted the topic separately below.
Update KB4517211 for Windows 10 V1903
After tests with insiders (see Windows 10 19H2 Insider Preview in Release Preview Ring) Microsoft released the update KB4517211 for Windows 10 Version 1903 on September 26, 2019. The cumulative non-security (optional) update KB4517211 contains a huge list of fixed bugs in Windows 10 Version 1903 and Windows Server Version 1903. I reported about it in the article Windows 10 V1903: Update KB4517211 released (09/26/2019).
Printer issues after installing Update KB4517211
I got the first notification about issues with update KB4517211 a few hours after release within this German comment. German blog reader Kay reported, that all printers on his system had disappeared after installing the Windows 10 Version 1903 update KB4517211. Kay wrote:
After the installation on a client PC all programs including Office reported “No printer installed” (not even the Windows internal ones – in “Devices and printers” all printers are grayed out) – but the web interfaces of the printers were accessible via browser (status ok).
In addition, the message “Print spooler service does not run” was displayed – manual start of the service was not successful either.
The only solution was to uninstall update KB4517211. Then everything ran as usual. I only guessed an isolated case, because the problem was negated by other blog readers. But blog reader Ralf reported in this German comment that the print queue had ended itself three times since installation (a few hours ago) and had to be restarted manually. Meanwhile two more German blog readers confirm these problems in comments. And also to my english blog post Windows 10: Issues with Updates KB4522015, KB4522016 / KB4517211 (Sept. 2019) contains confirmations from blog readers.
Meanwhile I also found something at askwoody.com, where a user describes the same issue. Update KB4517211 causes the spooler service for the printers to crash, so no more printers are detected. There the affected person can restart the service – but it crashes again during printing. This effect is also described in this Google Chrome support thread and within this German Dr. Windows forum. Currently I don’t know the condition to trigger this issue nor I know a workaround – beside uninstalling update KB4517211.
Addendum: I’ve escalated this issues to Microsoft’s developers – see this Microsoft Answers forum thread.
If someone is affected: Can you specify which printers are affected? It seems that only HP printers are affected and that reinstalling the driver via .inf file solves the issue.
Similar articles:
Windows 10: Issues with Updates KB4522015, KB4522016 / KB4517211 (Sept. 2019)Windows 10 V1903: Update KB4517211 released (09/26/2019)
Windows 10 Version 1903: Ready for broad realease
Windows 10 19H2 Insider Preview in Release Preview Ring