Canon S500: The handle is invalid

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August 18th, 2004, 04:52 PM
parsifal

Canon S500: The handle is invalid

Almost always when I try to print anything, XP informs me that "the handle is invalid". First this started to occur after XP had been up too long, about two hours or so, and later it became a problem that wouldn't get fixed even if PC got rebooted.
I learned that it has something to do with print spool service. Restarting this service helps once in a while, but usually it requires something more drastic like reinstalling printer drivers.

I've also read that having some HP printer drivers on computer may cause this with other printers. However, I do not have any such drivers. But: I am using HP's PC, and I've found some HP software on my hard disk installed by default. I guess it could therefore be possible that there were some hidden HP drivers on the PC, but I do not know where to look. And in any case I find it doubtful that any of such drivers were active. But you newer know...

So, if anyone can help me, I'd appreciate it.

I am using: XP Home SP1, Canon S500 and the latest drivers, and (I'm telling this because McAfee has caused some similar problems) Norton Internet Security (AV is 2004, firewall 2003), which didn't cause any problems on my previous PC and with the current printer.
August 19th, 2004, 02:12 PM
NooNoo

Which hp is it?

Is the printer connected via usb or parallel?
August 19th, 2004, 03:02 PM
parsifal

Quote:

Originally Posted by NooNoo

Which hp is it?

The PC? Pavilion t549.fi (I think only Finnish(.fi) and French(.fr) versions are available). The printer driver supposed to cause problems is that of HP4000. I, however, have never had one.

Quote:

Is the printer connected via usb or parallel?

Parallel.

This is the knowledge base article I found
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=180892

Most notably the part:

Quote:

NOTE: This behavior can occur when you try to print to printers other than HP4000-series printers if HP Complete Printing System for Windows is installed on the computer.

I have found no traces of it on my system.
August 20th, 2004, 07:03 AM
NooNoo

What type of lpt1 port (parallel port) is assigned in bios? What type is it in device manager?
August 21st, 2004, 06:24 PM
parsifal

Quote:

Originally Posted by NooNoo

What type of lpt1 port (parallel port) is assigned in bios? What type is it in device manager?

ECP in both.

Assigned IRQ in BIOS is 7. The device manager's port settings section under "filters' resource method" (whatever it is in English) is set to never use any interrupt. Resources section shows only two I/O ranges and a DMA channel. The DM displays no conflicts.
August 22nd, 2004, 05:20 AM
NooNoo

Uninstall the printer, remove the lpt1 entry in device manager, shut down and change it in bios to epp.

Reboot and allow windows to install the lpt port again, then reboot and install the printer again.
August 22nd, 2004, 06:15 AM
parsifal

I did as you adviced, and so far it works great. Hopefully it will stay that way. Thank you!

But how come it works?

http://whatis.techtarget.com/definit...212069,00.html says the following:

Quote:

EPP is for non-printer peripherals. ECP is for printers and scanners.
August 22nd, 2004, 06:33 AM
NooNoo

depends on how the standard is implemented in the bios and the printer and the printer driver.

sometimes ecp standards are badly implemented and using the fall back of epp or "normal" will solve the problem because it no longer tries to use the extended capabilities which are part of the standard.
August 22nd, 2004, 07:31 AM
confus-ed

'Extra' .. as she beat me to this one again ..

Many bioses have a setting 'ecp/epp' (so both at 'once') for lpt1, if you can then use this setting, as it gives you benefits both ways around, it'll first try & use the simplest way & only call extended fuctions when the port signals 'no function' back, as a rule of thumb (when its present) its good, its how I set bios in any new board when I don't know what might get connected to it (Hp printers will always try & use ecp fuctions as they wrote the standard a very nerdy link about ecp - they don't however write very good drivers to use with their own stuff :eek2: ).
September 11th, 2004, 06:22 AM
parsifal

It's back. It worked fine for a while, but today the same problem occured again. I've had XP up for 5 minutes and it won't print anymore. Nothing seems to help. I tried ECP, EPP and Bi-directional setting, but none of them helped (combined ECP+EPP is not possible, and though BIOS info tells there's an option of "output only" it won't let me choose that, only cycles through the three I mentioned). And yes, I did uninstall the port using Device Manager before changing BIOS settings.
September 11th, 2004, 07:39 AM
confus-ed

Must be the printer queue then & not the printer, so something is maybe interfering with that like perhaps my old favourite for 'messing stuff up' - NAV !!!( I must say now, that whenever I encounter any 'weirdness' & NAV is around, rather than spend 'forever' googling, I just completely uninstall the damn thing & then re-install {having tested my 'whatever' while its not on there}

Can you clarify, this bit ?

Quote:

..using: XP Home SP1, Canon S500 and the latest drivers, and (I'm telling this because McAfee has caused some similar problems) Norton Internet Security (AV is 2004, firewall 2003)..

Maybe that'll give us some clues..
September 11th, 2004, 11:05 AM
parsifal

Quote:

Originally Posted by confus-ed

Must be the printer queue then & not the printer, so something is maybe interfering with that like perhaps my old favourite for 'messing stuff up' - NAV !!!( I must say now, that whenever I encounter any 'weirdness' & NAV is around, rather than spend 'forever' googling, I just completely uninstall the damn thing & then re-install {having tested my 'whatever' while its not on there}

I too, then, should probably uninstall it. I just wouldn't like to frequently install and uninstall it because of problems like this. Perhaps I should switch to another AV/Firewall. Too bad. I really like NAV. Good thing I haven't paid anything yet (it came with the PC).

Edited: Any hints? Something similar to NAV's functionality would be good.

Quote:

Can you clarify, this bit ?

I don't know for sure, but I possibly remembered it wrong. I can't locate where I originally read it from, and all I can now come up with is more or less the following:
"The latest version of McAfee VirusScan 4.0.2 seems to cause problems when running on Windows 95 or Windows 98. You may see an error saying "The handle is invalid" when trying to run an executable file. There is a service pack directory on the McAfee CD at \McAfee\win9x\sp1. (See Desktop Support). You should install the service pack files if you are using the Novell provided NetWare Clients on Windows 95/98."
http://www.umkc.edu/is/tc/publicatio..._8/Bits_8.html

I am not, however, using Novell software and/or Windows 9X. I guess my memory played tricks on me. I apologize.
September 11th, 2004, 02:52 PM
confus-ed

So my (& I think the forum's) general free pick for av/firewall combo is AVG & kerio (they both also have paid versions), both are pretty good (you may have to 'keep tabs' on AVG being up to date AV definition wise),& much less system intensive than NAV too :thumbs:

Have you now tried minus Nav to see yet ?
September 12th, 2004, 02:02 PM
parsifal

Quote:

Originally Posted by confus-ed

Have you now tried minus Nav to see yet ?

Yes. I've been running without NAV for a little while, and so far everything has worked great. I'll see how it goes and inform you later.
September 13th, 2004, 01:43 AM
confus-ed

Quote:

Originally Posted by parsifal

Yes. I've been running without NAV for a little while, and so far everything has worked great. I'll see how it goes and inform you later.

So we'll see then .. though we've been here before :D

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