Lost all Printers. Where are printers stored?

[edjusted]

I'm using Sequoia and all my Printers are gone.

Sure, I could manually set them all up again one at a time, but I have good backups and a Time Machine backup. But where are the Printers/settings stored?

I've tried the following:
Restore /Library/Printers
Restore /Library/Printers/InstalledPrinters.plist
Restore /Library/Preferences/org.cups.printers.plist
Restore ~/Library/Printers (this is empty though)
Restore ~/Library/Preferences/org.cups.PrintingPrefs.plist
Restore ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.print.add.plist

Some of the instructions I've found online are pretty old, so I'm not sure if Sequoia stores this info in the same places.

 

[Chancha]

I would advise to re-do the printer driver install manually, if you can.

I just went through this with my small-ish business / studio. The trigger is definitely macOS Sequoia 15.7 update, at first I thought it must be the usual suspects like Adobe, but seeing the affected areas are system-wide then I knew Apple ****ed up.

Some Macs lose the entire printer altogether. Some other just got preset resetted, which is even more harmful, we printed dozens to hundreds of pages thinking it is black and white while they turned back to default colored, of course the meter counted...

Like you I looked into restoring settings, but seeing I don't want to risk it so just re-do the installation to be safe.
(in our case we even need to adjust some settings manually in the Unix CUPS server web access, so maybe that's why I am being extra careful)

 

[Chancha]

Just an update:

Most of our machines have been printing fine after my above procedure. But one of them (an M3 Ultra Mac Studio if that matters), loses all printers again even after manually reinstalling everything.

I checked into the /private/etc/cups directory, find out that the "printers.conf" file is the culprit, and at exactly 0:00 AM midnight there is a new config file generated by unknown source that is simply a blank printer list. The original config file is still there, but renamed into "printers.conf.O"

Still investigating what is going on. No solution found.

edit:
found a Reddit Mac Sys Admin thread talking about the same issue. Looks to be happening to both 15.7 and 14.8.

https://www.reddit.com/r/macsysadmin/comments/1nqbjm6/updating_to_latest_macos_patch_157_or_148_deletes

 

[epinette]

Issue: Printers are deleted every day after installing macOS 15.7

Description:
Since upgrading to macOS 15.7, printers are deleted every day at midnight (00:00) if a user session remains logged in. If the user session is closed before midnight, the printers are not deleted.

Update:
After installing macOS 15.7.1 Public Beta, the issue has been resolved. Printers are no longer deleted at 00:00; they remain configured even if a user session stays open overnight.

Update 2:
The problem still exist on macOS 15.7.1.

 

[Chancha]

My current solution is to set the machines to sleep at 23:00 PM, and just make the users manually wake the Mac up. This was confirmed that 100% of the slept machines the reset does not happen.

Good news that the 15.7.1 beta has resolved this. I am choosing to wait out for the actual release, not gonna risk having other issues by enabling beta, have had enough issues as it is.

Seriously I thought avoiding Tahoe was enough. Turns out Apple has no trouble screwing up older OS'es.

 

[edjusted]

I actually upgraded to Tahoe MacOS 26 this weekend, and the bug "stayed."

I'm the OP and posted this on 9/24.
I manually re-installed *one* printer and have been using that while waiting/looking for the fix.

I decided to upgrade to Tahoe on Saturday.
Today, 9/29 Monday, I noticed that the one printer I installed *also* disappeared.

I managed to restore my printers from different combinations of these files in /private/etc/cups:
printers.conf
printers.conf.pre-update
printers.conf.O

It took me multiple tries and I also killed cupsd and rebooted in between tries before it finally took.

But when printing from Chrome specifically, it gave me the choice of printing to an older printer that *is* visible in printers.conf but *not* visible in the Printers & Scanners preferences panel.

I understand that 15.7.1 might fix this (and I noticed it was released today but for some reason, none of the typical Apple news sites have picked this up), but I wonder if 26.0.1 will fix it?

I'm installing 26.0.1 now, but after the manual restore I've done, I'm not sure I'm in the best position to validate this.

 

[M4th]

While I do have a printer (Epson WF-110) that doesn't get used all that much, I did need it yesterday to print out a multi-page pdf document.

I suppose since I always shut down the M4 pro mini every night, haven't run into any issues with Sequoia 15.7 and just awhile ago now 15.7.1.

Hopefully the latest update has fixed it for those who've had issues, or use the workaround @Chancha figured out.

 

[Chancha]

Have good news to report.
I just used a test machine (M1 MBA) to confirm the following:

A fresh, wipe and install instance of 15.7.1 build 24G231 (this build is oddly at a lower number than the 24G309 dev RC of last week's)
Install printer driver, manually set presets in CUPS web interface as usual
confirm it prints fine
turn off auto NTP time server, set time manually, clock it to 23:59:50
I just stared at the private/etc/cups folder, wait for 00:00 to pass, don't see the printers.conf gets edited like you would on 15.7.0. After 10 minutes still see nothing.

So yes I feel confident about 15.7.1 fixing this ****. Will deploy it to all our affected Macs after hours tonight.

edit: saw someone else on the Reddit thread reporting 15.7.1 not fixing this. I will keep an eye on our machines since I only tested this on a fresh install, perhaps it would take other installed apps and user settings to trigger the midnight overwrite.

 

[Chancha]

Well...

I waited for our 00:00, remoted into 4 different Macs that area already upgraded to 15.7.1, in which 3 of them lost printers where only one remained. This one Mac is close to a fresh install, while the other has had regular usage, printing-wise.

I am at a loss.

 

[jefnot]

...

 

[pablorph]

Having sames issues with 8 iMacs at work. Install, reinstall then come back to work next day and they're gone. Had IT person spend over an hour working on each installation Friday. Today, several printers missing. This is on 15.7, 15.7.1 and 1 computer I reluctantly updated to 26.0. I did update from 26.0 to 26.0.1on the one computer today so hopefully will see if that helps. Any other suggestions?

 

[Chancha]

Having sames issues with 8 iMacs at work. Install, reinstall then come back to work next day and they're gone. Had IT person spend over an hour working on each installation Friday. Today, several printers missing. This is on 15.7, 15.7.1 and 1 computer I reluctantly updated to 26.0. I did update from 26.0 to 26.0.1on the one computer today so hopefully will see if that helps. Any other suggestions?

Over on Reddit someone claimed upgrading to betas of 15.7.1 and 15.7.2 actually stopped the behaviour. The 15.7.2 is not yet RC and the 15.7.1 was a dev version released earlier than the actual public 15.7.1. Either way I am not risking to install betas on our production machines so I am waiting for the eventual official 15.7.2 to see.

Meanwhile, the nightly sleeping method before 00:00 has been working. We stick to doing this for now. Though one time on one machine it seems it woke itself very shortly after the sleep command, so it survived the midnight being awake thus "successfully" deleted its printers. So this is quite predictable, and I saw some other admin go as far as scheduling shutdowns and boot up which should be more clearcut.

If it ain't broke don't fix it. I hope Apple got the same memo.

 

[brandair]

Same here on a Studio Ultra M2 after making the mistake to trust Apple CQ and updating MacOS Sequoia to the latest. All printer get reset/deleted frequently. Thanks, Tim Cook.

Just an update:

Most of our machines have been printing fine after my above procedure. But one of them (an M3 Ultra Mac Studio if that matters), loses all printers again even after manually reinstalling everything.

I checked into the /private/etc/cups directory, find out that the "printers.conf" file is the culprit, and at exactly 0:00 AM midnight there is a new config file generated by unknown source that is simply a blank printer list. The original config file is still there, but renamed into "printers.conf.O"

Still investigating what is going on. No solution found.

edit:
found a Reddit Mac Sys Admin thread talking about the same issue. Looks to be happening to both 15.7 and 14.8.

https://www.reddit.com/r/macsysadmin/comments/1nqbjm6/updating_to_latest_macos_patch_157_or_148_deletes

 

[tgressly]

So it might be a solution to schedule a task (cron, MDM etc.) to run a few minutes after midnight that renames the file /private/etc/cups/printers.conf.O back to /private/etc/cups/printers.conf
I'm going to try this approach.

 

[Chancha]

So it might be a solution to schedule a task (cron, MDM etc.) to run a few minutes after midnight that renames the file /private/etc/cups/printers.conf.O back to /private/etc/cups/printers.conf
I'm going to try this approach.

This solution makes sense if your priority is to never sleep / shutdown the Macs? To me, preventing the deletion seems to be more issue proof.

That said, just last night this M3 Ultra Mac Studio that I am typing on right now, deleted printers again, because for some reasons it woke itself up before midnight (in my case I cannot do a scheduled shutdown)

 

[tgressly]

This solution makes sense if your priority is to never sleep / shutdown the Macs? To me, preventing the deletion seems to be more issue proof.

That said, just last night this M3 Ultra Mac Studio that I am typing on right now, deleted printers again, because for some reasons it woke itself up before midnight (in my case I cannot do a scheduled shutdown)

Since many of my users are working past midnight, it was the best option to implement via MDM.

 

[Chancha]

Since many of my users are working past midnight, it was the best option to implement via MDM.

In that case I guess you are correct, that may be the best solution. Though you will then depend on the fact the conf.O exists and with the correct printer settings inside, which should be the case but we never know. For reference, on one of our machines I observed it created an extra printers.conf.B which is also blank, while the conf.O is indeed what we expect is in it, the actual correct settings.

 

[jefnot]

so far: using a 1am cron job to find machine with 0 printers, then recreate all printers by command.

 

[chrfr]

Supposedly the fix for this is to go into System Settings/Sharing/Remote Management. Then click options, and turn off “Generate reports.”

 

[wbg10]

Supposedly the fix for this is to go into System Settings/Sharing/Remote Management. Then click options, and turn off “Generate reports.”

Interesting. I'm having this problem on multiple (Sequoia 15.7.1) Macs, too. I'll try this tip on several of them. Thanks.

 

[Chancha]

Supposedly the fix for this is to go into System Settings/Sharing/Remote Management. Then click options, and turn off “Generate reports.”

I have tried doing this on one affected machines, the printers are deleted as usual, so it does not seem to help in our case.

 

[chrfr]

I have tried doing this on one affected machines, the printers are deleted as usual, so it does not seem to help in our case.

It looks like I remembered this backwards. It seems you need to disable this on the Remote Desktop app side of things. Others have reported this works:

In the meantime you can work around this by disabling a reporting option for these systems.In ARD Admin, Select the client(s), Get Info (Command + i), Click the Reporting tab then click the Edit button, Disable the 'System Profile' option. Click the Done button to save the changes.

Alternatively, disable Remote Management on the client if it's not needed.

 

[Chancha]

It looks like I remembered this backwards. It seems you need to disable this on the Remote Desktop app side of things. Others have reported this works:

Alternatively, disable Remote Management on the client if it's not needed.

Okay folks I can confirm this exact method works!

I had two identical machines that are known to have printers deleted if not slept. On one I follow the above and disabled reporting on all ARD clients in our network. Then as a control I didn't touch any settings for the other Mac. Can confirm the printer deletion only happened on the control, which still has the ARD report option enabled by default (on those clients).

Thank you; I wonder where you got that bit from and how did someone discover the reason is ARD system profile? The logs I have do not point to this.

 

[chrfr]

Okay folks I can confirm this exact method works!

I had two identical machines that are known to have printers deleted if not slept. On one I follow the above and disabled reporting on all ARD clients in our network. Then as a control I didn't touch any settings for the other Mac. Can confirm the printer deletion only happened on the control, which still has the ARD report option enabled by default (on those clients).

Thank you; I wonder where you got that bit from and how did someone discover the reason is ARD system profile? The logs I have do not point to this.

I got it from a Slack I'm in, and the person who posted it got the info from their Apple System Engineer and was told they could share that info. I assume that it will be addressed in the 26.1 update, if not sooner.

 

[brandair]

But for the ARD hack to work you need a remote/additional machine, since you cannot do this on the control desktop, right? Then it's a useless hack except for network admins. I did disable the journal reporting in the Preferences > Sharing > Remote Mngmt, but this prevents nothing.