HP Device Monitor Constantly Taking 70-88% of CPU

[MickGinSB]

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@Riddle_Decipher wrote:

@tacofeast

Thank you for the update,

I appreciate your time and efforts, 

I'm glad we could contribute towards identifying and leading you towards the solution for this concern. 

You've been great to work with and it has been a genuine pleasure interacting with you.

I hope both you and your product works great and remain healthy for a long time 😉 

To simply say thanks for my efforts to assist you, please click the "Thumbs Up" button to give me a Kudos.

Take care now and do have a fabulous week ahead. 🙂

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I'm wondering if this advice is still current?  I'm seeing my Macs use HP Device Monitor App over 8000 times in 22 hours.  Are you truly certain that this is not something we can turn off (or create greater intervals) on the 3 HP printers (2 LaserJet color M452dw-Airprint), both relatively new, and an OfficeJet 8600.  

It really seems excessive and we're trying to locate some gremlins in our home office network.

[IronBadger]

I am not sure why the deamon may be going a bit rogue on your devices but you can just turn it off completely if you are not using any of the scan to computer features from printer front control panel.

Simply go to /Users/username/Library/LaunchAgents and delete com.hp.devicemonitor.plist

Then reboot . This should prevent it from launching at login in the future.

You also could try resetting the print system and see if that remedies the situation.

The last step would be to download HP Easy Start and see if you have the latest version of the software installed.

OR since you are using Airprint for your print driver you can just uninstall the HP Software as it is not needed for Airprint.

You also use HP Easy Start to uninstall.  Once you launch HP Easy Start open teh Easy Start menu and select Uninstall HP Software..

[MickGinSB]

Thanks for your response.  I didn't hear from anyone for a few days, so I finally used an app to block it.  But I think you're right.   Uninstalling it is probably better.  I just wanted to understand what it was doing, IF it was doing its job properly.  With it blocked, I still print to my wired laser printer just as fast. 

Is this app just for the all in one inkjets (I have one) or does it also apply to the color LaserJets as well?

I was a bit loathe to reset the entire printing system since it all works fine except for this app pounding my network like it's neurotic and can't bear to be out of touch!  

I'll look at Easy Start, but when I fired it up, it looked like it might overwrite all of my settings and I wanted to know exactly what it was going to do before introducing more chaos into the system.

[IronBadger]

1. HP Device Monitor - it runs in the background waiting for a device (MFP) to initiate a scan from the front control panel.  It is the "listener" for the scan to computer functionality.  It would not affect printing at all.

2. HP Easy Start will discover and download the latest driver for your devices.  If there is an update the driver can be updated without deleting the existing queues.  It also has teh ability to uninstall allthe HP Software as I mentioned previously.

[AngryPoetnerd]

I too am having this problem.

I'd say the problem is not solved because:

1. 5 months after IronBadger's message, there is no new version of HP newer than what I currently have with the rogue HP Device Monitor.
2. Like MickGinSB, I'd like to minimize the impact on my pieces of my configuration that actually work.  (I am extremely disappointed with the HP software's inability to reliably and repeatably detect devices and their abilities.  Every time I re-install the software, I have to do it twice: Once to get the software in place, and once to delete all my printers and re-discover so that the Black & White printer option shows up.)
3. I just downloaded HP Easy Start. The version it unpacks is dated 13 July 2019. It contains NO options for uninstalling HP software -- not in the screens it steps me through. Not in the menus. A call to HP first said yes it does, and then a second phone call said no it doesn't. The latest advice I have for doing an Uninstall is that I should just find the drivers and apps myself and put them in the Trash.

I tried IronBadger's solution of:

    Simply go to /Users/username/Library/LaunchAgents and delete com.hp.devicemonitor.plist

some time ago, but the file kept re-appearing after I deleted it.  I don't know what keeps re-enabling the monitor, but I want it to stop.

The question remains:

Where is this device monitor and how can it be reliably killed?

[IronBadger]

HP Easy Start does have the uninstaller included.  I am not sure who you spoke with.  As posted previously you access the Uninstall through the Hp Easy Start menu.

As for killing HP Device Monitor...you are correct.  It does seem to "re-spawn" on it's own.  From what I can tell, it is able to do this because the framework that contains the app loads at system start up.

The app going rogue on your system, to me, still points to some other issue as there are not very many reports of this.  But to ensure HP Device Monitor does not load in your environment you can do the following.

1. Delete ~/Library/Printers/hp/Frameworks/HPDeviceMonitoring.framework

2. Reboot

3. Delete ~/Users/username/Library/LaunchAgents/com.hp.devicemonitor.plist

I did this as a test on my system and it works w/o generating any errors.  However you will not be able to use Scan to Computer from the front panel of the printer AND you will not be able to enable Scan to Computer in the HP Utility.

I am sure there is something a bot less drastic we can probably do....but as of right now I have not found it.

[AngryPoetnerd]

Thanks very much, IronBadger!

Indeed I missed the "Uninstall HP Software" item on the first card. Your image enclosures were a great help!

It turns out that the HPDeviceMonitoring.framework directory on my system was under "/" rather than my home directory.

Removing it, and rebooting seems to have made HP Device Monitor go away.  I did not need to delete "...LaunchAgents/com.hp.devicemonitor.plist" after the reboot.  It was just gone.

So in my case the following worked:

1. Delete /Library/Printers/hp/Frameworks/HPDeviceMonitoring.framework
2. Reboot

Follow-on issue:

On a previous run of HP Easy Start, I slapped it and said use the stock Apple drivers.  So with some confidence, I re-enabled the HP drivers.  Unfortunately after doing this, the "Print in Black & White"  option disappeared. Indeed it seems like one has to delete printers created by HP Easy Start, and re-add them in the Apple System Preferences "Printers & Scanners" pane in order to get that option back.

I guess I'll have to search the forums for resolution to that one.  But perhaps you know off hand...

Additional Detail:

The full name of the printer configured by HP Easy Start is: "HP Color LaserJet MFP 477fdw"

The full name of the printer I get when I reset printing and re-add the printer is, "HP Color LaserJet MFP 477fdw (5D7EC7)", and it is identified as being of kind "HP Color LaserJet MFP 477fdw-AirPrint"

By re-issuing Printer Discovery, did I just quit using the HP Drivers?  (The clue is seeing "-AirPrint" om tje "Kind" field)

I'm wondering if B&W printing isn't actually an option for the HP driver.