Windows Server 2008 Terminal Server session sporadically prints 0 bytes

• Friday, June 01, 2012 6:31 PM

   

   
  

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  We are running a Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V virtual machine as a Terminal Server for several clients.  SP2 is installed and Windows Updates are up to date.  Periodically we get calls from clients saying that they cannot print to their local printers.  In general, printing will work for weeks and then it will stop.  Sometimes rebooting the server will fix the issue (though this is impractical since there are many users on at any one time).  Sometimes rebooting the client will fix the issue.  Sometimes rebooting both will have no effect on the problem.  The user receives no error message and the printing appears to be successful.  However the printer never prints anything.  We have found a strong, if not perfect, correlation between these printing failures and that fact that we are sending 0 bytes to the printer. 

  The same user may be able to print to a different printer, and a different user may be able to print to the same printer - even while the initial user continues to have the problem.

  The text from the event viewer for a successful and unsuccessful print job show here.

  Document 37, Pricing for ANN6931AA: American Legacy III Var Ann 959362538 (5/31/2012 - 5/31/2012) owned by <username> was printed on HP Officejet 6500 E710n-z (Copy 1) (redirected 6) through port TS082.  Size in bytes: 0. Pages printed: 1. No user action is required.

  To stop logging information events for the print spooler, in Control Panel, open Printers, right-click a blank area of the window, click Run as Administrator, click Server Properties, click the Advanced tab, and then clear the Log spooler information events check box.

  Document 36, Pricing for ANN6931AA: American Legacy III Var Ann 959362538 (5/31/2012 - 5/31/2012) owned by <username> was printed on KONICA MINOLTA C650 Series PCL (redirected 6) through port TS089.  Size in bytes: 60716. Pages printed: 1. No user action is required.

  To stop logging information events for the print spooler, in Control Panel, open Printers, right-click a blank area of the window, click Run as Administrator, click Server Properties, click the Advanced tab, and then clear the Log spooler information events check box.

  We have set up auditing on the c:\windows\system32\spool\printers folder to help diagnose.  There are no failure audits reported the correlate to failed printing attempts.  There are also no successful audit records.

  We noticed a very similar issue with Windows Server 2000 SP3 here http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=328020.  This looks to have been resolved with a hotfix.

  We cannot find anything that is relevant to our situation in forums or by searching.  Does anyone have a direction to go on this? Does microsoft have a hotfix for Windows Server 2008 SP2 for this like the fix for Windows Server 2000 SP3?

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