re-installation problems

[becca-j]

I unplugged my printer from my computer (while it was all turned on) thinking that i was swapping printers with a friend, but it turned out they didn't need my old printer, so i plugged it back in as it still had plenty of ink left, whereas the other one had none. As soon as i tried to print from photoshop i got a message saying 'printing failed'. the same thing happened when i tried printing from the web. i tried restarting the computer, which had no effect; moving the USB from the back to the front, which made photoshop tell me the image was too large for the paper, and when i continued all i got out was a long line of numbers and letters at the top of the paper. I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling from the original CD and from an updated installation file downloaded from the HP troubleshooting site. None of these has worked, despite the printer icon appearing in the control panel: printers & faxes area with the default tick by it. The message i get after installation is "Found New Hardware Wizard. Cannot Install this Hardware. There was a problem installing this hardware: hp photosmart 7550 series. An error occured during the installation of this device. The system cannot find the file specified. Click finish to close the wizard." When i click finish it makes the USB ping, comes up with a yellow 'found new hardware' dialogue box at the task bar and then the found new hardware wizard appears again. I don't understand this, it's the only printer that has ever been connected to this computer, and i've unplugged the usb cable before to move things around without any problems at all. If anyone has any suggestion i would love to hear them! Thanks, Becca.

[becca-j]

I've tried to install my other printer now (deskjet 940c), using the HP cd that came with it- which immediately crashed my computer. when i tried again using the xp compatible driver downloaded from the hp site it did exactly the same thing. it seemed to work when i restarted, but i'm still getting the same hardware wizard saying it couldn't install and i can't print a ruddy thing!! I work from home and i need a printer for my work- it costs me 25p per sheet at the library and i can't keep nipping out to print out reference pics for my work. If anybody knows a reason for this, whether it's caused by hp, windows xp or my pc i would love to know.

Message Edited by becca-j on 07-31-2009 05:57 AM

Message Edited by becca-j on 07-31-2009 05:58 AM