My printer won't work

[evilhomer]

Windows XP home
HP Deskjet 890C

Printer has worked fine for years. I hooked up a Lexmark Printer/Scanner and apparently that made the HP jealous because it hasn't worked since. It prints a test page from it's own buttons fine so it still functions. The printer queue says it's printing, but nothing comes out. I've restarted and turned everything off and on. I've checked all the cables, they're fine. I deleted and re-installed the HP. I unhooked the Lexmark and deleted it from the system. Still nothing.

Any suggestions?

[Mr. Rager!]

Stupid questions.

Are you sure you're selecting the right printer when you go to print?

[MrSmiley]

The only suggestion I have is to make sure Lexmark didn't install it's own print manager software... I believe they have at least one in the various software suites, with "optimized settings for best print quality" and "easy access to common settings". Bascially something that occurs before the printer spool does.

Depending on how the printer is hooked up, you may also want to check the port settings. Sometimes I feel like I'm the only person that still uses LPT1, but I know there at least you can have different printers fight about EPP/ECP and the coding of the data sent.

Other than that, you're not alone... one of my previous computer systems was a setup where practically the same thing happened, one of the printers stopped working when I plugged in another brand's printer and/or scanner. I'm a little sketchy on my memory because I eventually just gave up and hooked the problem printer to my OTHER computer (which was networked), but I do remember they were *gasp* HP and Lexmark... I've owned about 3 HP printers, 2 Lexmark printers and a scanner from each company over the years . I can't even remember if the problem occurred on a Windows98 setup or if I was into XP by that time.

[evilhomer]

Never a stupid question. Always first assume you're dealing with a moron

Thanks Mr.Smiley. I uninstalled the crap that Lexmark put on and it did the trick. I guess that software should come with the warning "Doesn't play well with others".