Freaking PCs, firefox, and printers

[macswitcha2]

FF is fine, I use it on W7 with NoScripts
it also happens to be standard in alot of XP SOE's, so calm down. Unessesary crap is bad, but FF is for alot of people worth having.


Also try installing just the printer drivers and not the full software package.
Make sure you eliminate the data and pritner itself as potential issues.

If I understand you correctly, she can currently print from some documents, but not from her PDF reader? I agree that I would first try installing another PDF reader and seeing if the problem persists. Also, I would recommend re-installing the printer (if it was not just detected via plug and play) and this time right-click on the installer and choose 'Run as Administrator,' as it also sounds like there could be a permissions error causing the issue.

When I get a chance, I will attempt all these suggestions. I don't live with my girl and don't see her usually during the week.

It looks like we are going to have to try all these suggestions since the HP and even the Sony people couldn't fix the problem and they literally spent about two days trying to fix it.

 

[Habitus]

I know this a mac site but hear me out... On my girls new laptop I installed firefox (FF) said that it needed to make changes to the computer so i clicked yes and the printer (HP Laserjet 1020) stopped working...it said that no printer was installed so I thought that firefox caused this since the printer was working fine just a couple minutes before installing FF...so I uninstalled it. The printer still was not working...did a system restore and nothing...

My girl calls HP, they spent almost two hours via remote access trying to fix it...messing around with the registry to no avail. They hook her up with Smart Friend and now she has to spend $57 to have them try to fix it.

I am happy to be a mac owner and not deal with this crap. However, I feel sorry for my girl... Is there anyone that can explain what happened? Any Current Mac and PC users that knows a free solution?

Btw, she has a Sony Vaio CW series with Windows 7.

Sounds like FF is the culprit. Have you tried reinstalling the print drivers? Always worked for me.

Good luck

Habitus

 

[macswitcha2]

Ok...after a couple of days ...the HP people finally got the Printer to work. Before, my girl simply downloaded the needed Driver for HP Laser jet 1020 to have it work on her Sony Vaio. This time the HP people had her use the actual physical disk that the printer came with, tinkered around a little, and fixed the issue. My girl was able to again remove Norton and Google Chrome and some other unneeded ware. The HP people even helped her get faster internet by doing something. Who knows?


Now, should she go on with what she has or should I purchase her an actual Windows 7 Professional for $64 via school discount, wipe her HD clean and install Windows & so that only the windows 7 is on there rather than it an whole list of bloatware?

In a nutshell, I want my girl to have the best experience she can have with her Sony Vaio before she can one day get a mac, therefore what is the best thing to do?

 

[ARF900]

If it works, dont fix it. Just leave it alone, the last thing you want to do is install windows 7 fresh and have the printer not work.

Windows is like Janga, the smallest touch can ruin the whole thing.

 

[steve2112]

Ok...after a couple of days ...the HP people finally got the Printer to work. Before, my girl simply downloaded the needed Driver for HP Laser jet 1020 to have it work on her Sony Vaio. This time the HP people had her use the actual physical disk that the printer came with, tinkered around a little, and fixed the issue. My girl was able to again remove Norton and Google Chrome and some other unneeded ware. The HP people even helped her get faster internet by doing something. Who knows?


Now, should she go on with what she has or should I purchase her an actual Windows 7 Professional for $64 via school discount, wipe her HD clean and install Windows & so that only the windows 7 is on there rather than it an whole list of bloatware?

In a nutshell, I want my girl to have the best experience she can have with her Sony Vaio before she can one day get a mac, therefore what is the best thing to do?

If it is working, I wouldn't bother it right now. I would buy the copy of Windows 7, though. If nothing else, you will have it handy in case something like this happens again. Having a physical copy of the OS is always a good thing. You can always sell it later, probably for a profit, since you get such a huge discount. Personally, I would do a re-install from a clean disk to get rid of all the junk HP kindly pre-installs for you. I did on my HP desktop, but then again, I do that kind of stuff for a living. I can see where most people wouldn't want to bother with it. One other thing to try if you feel up to it is to make an image of the PC to an external HD while it is in a working, clean, state. It makes life easier.