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Old printer installation gives Status:Error
Would appreciate help with getting an old HP Photosmart 8450 printer working in W10 - if that's possible. It is connected by USB cable to my Win10 Pro 32 bit (Build 18363) desktop PC.
Beware: I may be using some incorrect terminology - I'm new to this...
I've spent a day looking into this topic and attempted many 'fixes' but still haven't been successful and I can't understand what's going on. 'Device manager' lists the HP printer (alongside my newer Brother printer that works fine) and 'Device manager>Properties' tells me it's working properly yet when I attempt to print a test page from 'HP Photosmart 8400 series', I get an error message ("Error printing on Hp..." etc). I can see the test page has been sent because it appears in the queue of documents ready to be printed. I've now deleted all documents in the queue.
A couple of days ago, I uninstalled the HP printer drivers then re-installed and it made no difference. I think these were generic Windows drivers. I did system restore today to take the system back a week or so but to no effect (didn't expect it to - just getting desperate really). The HP printer is rarely used, for photos only, so I don't think I've printed from it since "upgrading" to W10 from W7 (where it worked just fine) in January. I've tried to install the printer drivers from the original HP drivers disc but understandably, the drivers were incompatible with W10.
I've also done other things as well, including some online tutiorials which suggested a possible spooler problem so I cleared the printer spooling folder as suggested but that didn't help either. I've unplugged the USB cable, turned the printer on and off more times than I care to recall. One tutorial suggested the problem may have something to do with the printer port (currently DOT4_001) which I don't understand?
Any guidance gratefully received but bear in mind I won't understand jargon, thanks.